


Echoing Through Eternity

by LastHarlequin



Category: Final Fantasy VIII
Genre: "Realism", Alcohol, Body Horror, Body Modification, Crime, Drug Use, F/M, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Underage Relationship(s), More violence than canon-typical, Overly Cautious Tagging, Overthinking the setting, Post-Game, Sexually Threatening Situations, Slow Burn, Smoking, Sorry Angelo, Sorry Not Sorry, Sorry Rinoa, Sorry Seifer, Technically an AU, no beta we die like men, non-canon, rude and crude humor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:48:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 11
Words: 83,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25596025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LastHarlequin/pseuds/LastHarlequin
Summary: After Time Compression the world was saved, but only from Ultimecia.  The more mundane problems of a world where the state of Galbadia has been effectively decapitated twice in a month, Esthar was experiencing a Lunar Cry, Trabia lost its guardian to a missle strike have come to the fore.  There are precious few resources to solve these kinds of problems, and when it rains it pours.  (more tags as writing continues, I'm not 100% sure what's going to happen so it'll be a surprise to everyone, Read Tags After Updates!)
Relationships: Fujin/Squall Leonhart
Comments: 5
Kudos: 6
Collections: Island Closest to Hell





	1. Uprising

**Author's Note:**

> Crossposted from FF.net, Technically an AU, born of me taking a long hard look at the setting and the state of the world at the end of the story. Technically diverges in Lunatic Pandora from the Canon. I've overthought a bit and made some storytelling decisions and filled in some gaps that don't match up with the game terribly well, but are better for writing a story I hope you enjoy.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three Years is a long time, and it will take much longer to heal the scars of the third sorceress war, if they ever heal at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Re-edited for clarity and flow on 08/25/20.

Saving the world. Nothing is quite like the party when you can legitimately claim that as your accomplishment. The party lasted twenty-two hours, all told, until the music finally stopped and Balamb Garden returned to relative normality. The tale woven by the Fated Children of their adventure in the end of time itself was something that beggared belief, but there was enough evidence to back it up in the end for the student body to accept the truth. All the same, the world kept turning, and the state things were left in it would not hold. 

It was a further two days before the first messages found their way to Balamb Garden where it hovered temporarily at FH. Garden's previous infrastructure, built around Balamb Island proper, was a shamble and the exclusively hardline cable connections meant that the routing through the city of Balamb was a mess. Balamb found itself back aboard Fisherman's Horizon for a while, in the aftermath of everything, using their central position along the major railway connection east and west as a staging area to see what needed to happen next. Needless to say, communication was a priority amongst priorities.

It took a week to fully reorganize the Garden, the troubles had left it a wreck. With the desertion of the Faculty, and the abdication of Headmaster Cid, atop the loss of NORG's funding, Garden was running on it's own steam. Money would become an issue quickly, and the question of what to do with SeeD now that its intended purpose had been fully completed had to be answered. There were voices on both sides. The world was a bit of a mess, the greatest military power had been shivered by the loss of its dictator. What’s worse, Esthar was in the midst of the artificial Lunar Cry, and Trabia's disparate tribes were still reeling from the other artificial Lunar Cry not thirty years before, coupled to the loss of Trabia Garden as a defensive bulwark against the monster population leaving them nearly helpless.

The world was in turmoil and it looked like having a highly trained, competent force of troubleshooters would be needed still. It was rather more difficult to sort through the many different files and systems, Squall had to build a new faculty more or less on the spot. SeeD cadets began to be pulled away from the combat program and into bureaucratic and logistical lines as Garden found out what it knew. There was oceans of data to sort through, from client data, intelligence reports, banking information, budget reports. Squall was quickly overwhelmed. As much as he tried to shoulder the burden himself, Xu, Quistis, and Dr Kadowaki all cornered him to force him to delegate more. It was hectic, and it became impossible to know what ended up falling through the cracks in the reorganization at the end.

The largest structural change was taking on faculty from Esthar, the president's enthusiasm for the Garden project's success was odd (to all who didn't know about Squall and the President's personal history), but a diversion of a small number of clerks in exchange for discounted peacekeeping missions as the evacuation to Esthar city proper was fully underway from outlying settlements seemed reasonable enough recompense. This ended up being a fairly even exchange though as the relatively small military of Esthar was being badly stretched, holding out against the Lunar hordes. 

Meanwhile, Galbadia, never a strong client previously, was begging for attention. Squall got back to them and in a brief conversation with the former Secretary of Urban Affairs, the short of it was there was war brewing in Galbadia. With the fall of the sorceress, and the death of the charismatic Vinzer Deling, Galbadia was effectively decapitated.

When the small nation broke away from Dollet, it was nothing and only rose to power under the guidance of Deling. His sudden death left the vast military-industrial complex he had built headless. The sycophants and generals looked like they would be turning on each other and grabbing for whatever piece of the former nation they could hold with the citizenry caught in the middle. It was decided by a counsel of senior SeeD that intervention for the betterment of the people was preferable to letting civilization lose even more ground.

"So it's decided." Squall said to the three others in the room: Xu, a natural choice, top SeeD before the end of the world; Quistis, still one of the greater minds in the Garden, especially since Cid Kramer has vacated his post; the final being Selphie Tilmett, nobody had believed it when she stepped forward to head the budgetary committee, but she proved herself quickly. Her head for logistics and numbers was remarkable. Nobody should have been surprised, there was a reason she dove as hard as she did at the festival committee. Nonetheless she sighed and was first to comment.

"They have the funds, or rather, we think they do, we'll know more after the first round of negotiation." Xu nodded, she'd taken to the diplomatic role quickly and with aplomb, "I'll give them the run around for the first. It should do well for us to remind them of the recent… troubles that we've had with Galbadia, especially with Galbadia Garden going missing. It had lost, what? Seventy percent of its faculty with the military takeover?" she asked, largely rhetorically but Squall responded anyway.

"Near as our estimates can follow. Corroborating with Martine, he insists that more than half walked, and it's unreasonable to think none of them were lost in the battle. It's not as though there weren't significant losses, nearly all of the first year cadets were slain, and a third of the remainder, there weren't enough stocks of magical energy to go around to keep everyone fully junctioned with GF. So many of them are picky enough they will not split their power between multiple users, we were lucky with Ifrit, Shiva, Quetzalcoatl, and even Diablos to an extent. Though the latter respects few of us enough to work with him." Squall mused aloud, they had forty one SeeD or at least sufficiently advanced cadets to be considered for missions.

Without Galbadia and Trabia as feeders for promising cadets, they were working with only those cadets that survived the conflict. There was real potential danger there, especially if Garden was to remain mobile; which was in debate as well. Quistis raised the next point smoothly enough, one could almost imagine that somebody wanted to talk about it, "are we going to resume training?" She questioned, most of the instructors were still in Balamb, only two had participated in the conflicts, and only one had chosen sides in the internal matter even before the battle of Gardens. It was possible for them to go back to being the premier military academy of the world. As the sole practical users of GF-Junction, and with the absolute lack of trust placed in Dr Odine by anyone with sense. Garden had sole control over arguably the most powerful resource in the world, actual super soldiers. Everything Galbadia had been trying to do with their war machines, and Esthar had been pursuing both with their cybernetics program and monster breeding projects was embodied in the SeeD warrior. They could shrug off high caliber rounds, stand toe to toe with the worst demons the world can throw at them. Garden was safe from anything short of an intercontinental ballistic missile attack, that much was proven when the very best Galbadia had to offer bounced off the Garden's SeeD forces at twenty to one with only three SeeD killed in the action.

"We'll say a tentative yes." Squall commented after a long moment and Xu sighed audibly. Silence reigned for many moments before Squall broke it. 

"We'll look at dispatching a maximum of five teams to Gabania. That's hard maximum. And Xu? Get us the feeling in the capital when you're there. We want to know what the people think of the sides in this one before we commit to supporting one." Xu nodded and made a mark in her notes as the meeting continued on, to a discussion of budget for the next four months.

The meeting continued interminably though when night finally fell the internal system pinged in Squall terminal. He smiled subtly. "Excuse me, Rinoa is reminding me to actually sleep at some point." he said standing up while ignoring the smirk on Xu's face as well as Quistis' long suffering sigh and Selphie's giggle. He walked out of their meeting with a clearer picture of the path forward and a genuine hope for their future.

\------------------

Fisherman's horizon was a refuge for people who didn't have anywhere else to go and, for people who wanted no part of the troubles of the greater world. Sometimes both. But even here there was judgement. She sat on the dock, under a hole-filled parasol, quietly repairing a fishing net. Slightly curved needle and thick waxed thread in hand working with slow motions, unpracticed but intent. Beside her sat an old fisherman with arthritis gnarled hands. 

"Yes, just like that. You learn quick, young'un!" he said as he reached over and clapped her on the shoulder nearly knocking her over with the vigor of it. 

"Patience." she said simply as the old fisherman bobbed his head. "We'll make a fisher out of you yet." he said simply with a gap-toothed smile. She offered back a small, unpracticed one and continued working. Pausing a moment, she looked out at the water where Raijin was trying his hand at fishing. Strangely enough he had taken to the skill with remarkable passion. She shook her head thinking about it and nearly let out a laugh.

"Found some solace in the net have you?" the old man asks leaning forward onto his knees, looking out at the endless, sparkling ocean. 

"Many before you have." He let out a melancholy huff and leaned back against a support pillar. Leaving her to consider what was said. She had been trying not to think about it, but now she could not help it. Her smile faded away into a quiet frown, her eye looking down at the net as she slowly stitched and wove it back together, bit by slow bit. Her mind wandered, as it had not before, when she was so focused on doing the task correctly. She considered the last week, the long walk out of Esthar, the war the two of them had fought together.

Two. That word brought a bitterness to her. Seifer, they had been so close for so long. Only, once he had what he wanted so close at hand, he rejected them. Even after the sorceress' control lapsed, he still strove. He fought further even after the battle had been lost. She had told him he was being a fool, and he'd just smiled. Smiled that stupid, arrogant, selfish smile he had. Once she'd admired that smile, that wolfishness, the unwillingness to let go of even the shadow of potential victory. She remembered grabbing his arm and having it yanked away from her. She remembered pleading, shouting, screaming. And he just let her. He only said one thing… 

"Hold up girl." the old man's concerned voice pulled her from her thoughts. She looked down at her hands and saw the mess she'd made of the last few loops, then blinked, pushing an unshed tear out of her lashes that rolled down her face, giving her clarity to realize the mistake was far less than she'd first seen and hung her head. 

"It's alright, you have years to practice." the old man said solemnly. She almost laughed again, this time from anger. Seifer’s last words to her echoed in her brain, reverberating like a tuning fork. 

"Before I let my dream go, I'll die." Her teeth were clenched so tight her jaw ached, her hands were balled white-knuckled, staring out at the sea. 

"Here." she felt something tap her shoulder, a small bottle. So old the labels had worn off entirely, glass. She brought it to her lips expecting something sharp, but only clean water hit her tongue. She drank greedily as though it could wash the anger, and painful introspections away. The old man waited for her to hand the empty bottle back and said nothing for a long moment. 

"Sorry." she said quietly. He patted her shoulder. "It's fine, there's enough. For all of us." he said simply and his words settled on her like a blanket. She considered them as her hands started to move again, weaving the net. The feeling of restlessness inside her retreated, just a little.

It was just getting dark when the boats came back in, She was there to meet them as the catch of the day was unloaded and the take parceled out. She met Raijin with a hug and helped him with his share. The two of them walking home a small lean-to near the outer edge of the platform. They had gotten it sealed more or less against the wind, with a single long bulb lighting the tiny hovel. Two bedrolls, a small hand-filled basin that was both sink and top tank for the sanitation system. They cooked on an electric stove, Power being as abundant as water and fish on the little man made solar cell they called home.

Fisherman's Horizon was a quiet place where people could disappear. Strange miracle that there were no true sea monsters. Maybe there was no water on the moon? She walked to stand in the doorway, looking up to the first bright stars showing through the sunset. Meanwhile, Raijin showed off his domestic skills as he got the induction cooker going and the pan heated with a little oil before laying on the fillets. She was tired of fish. She was tired of fishing, she was tired of pretending she didn't want to do something else. She crossed her arms as she looked up at the pale shadow of the moon. It was many long minutes of Raijin's quiet chatter. He mostly talked to himself, knowing she had little to say these days.

Neither of them had shared their names around the place. It was almost taboo here to ask about the past. They had distinctive enough appearances, though that they'd been recognized by some. She'd caught some evil glances, enough to give her the creeps a few times.

Avoiding the confrontation seemed to be working so far though. "Hey, food's gonna be ready in a second, ya'know?" Raijin called out to her, making her jump. 

"Right." she said, walking back to retrieve the metal plates and let Raijin pile it up with the day's catch. She ate mechanically, her mind elsewhere, best not to focus on what you ate, or the monotony of it would grate before too long. They ate in companionable silence. Just about the only thing that could make Raijin quiet was food, even back at Garden.

She sighed to herself, pushing bits of quickly cooling fish around her plate. 

"What's up, girl?" he asked as she started and looked up at him. She considered a few answers with her mouth full before settling eventually to mumble. 

"Change." he leaned in and seemed to consider what she'd said, mulling it over.

"You thinking about Seifer again?" he asked, and she bristled, the hairs on the back of her neck standing up and her teeth showing. Neither of them looked at the cloth wrapped bundle in the corner. The few effects they had kept from the ruins of Lunatic Pandora at the end of the war loomed large in the peripheral. He raised a hand trying to forestall violence.

"Okay! Nope! Not that! Um…." he trailed off, bringing a hand to his chin as she calmed herself down. 

"We don't have that much gil, I guess we could throw some at some rice…." he said thoughtfully and she sighed hanging her head. 

"No. Quiet." she said sweeping an arm and his eyes opened wide.

"Oh! Well… I guess it is pretty peaceful, but that is what we agreed we wanted, ya'know?" he asked, looking sheepish. She hung her head. 

"Yes…" He sat up straighter, "I guess we could move on, there's a whole world out there still!" he said with a smile. 

But she could see the strain at the edges of it, he might not even know it himself. She set down her plate and walked over to him putting her hands on his huge shoulders. 

"Stay." she says and his face rapid fires from a more genuine smile to a concerned frown.

"Wait, you saying You’re gonna go?" he asks, jabbing a finger at her middle, forcing her step back. "We're all we got! I ain't…" he started as she held up her hands, took his and set it back in his lap. 

"Happy?" she asks quietly and he scratches the back of his head. "Well… yeah kinda. I… but you…" he started and she puts a hand on his chest. 

"Unhappy." she says forestalling him.

"I ain't wanna lose my li'l sister." he says quietly, his eyes getting misty, which has her eyes getting misty right back. She turns her back on him and wraps her arms around herself. 

"Change." she says as she walks to the door and sits down next to it. He's left standing where she was, arms open only for them to drop despondent.

"Deserve." she says definitively as she looks up at him.

"...Oh." Is all the massive young man can conjure. 

"...what are you gonna do?" he asked softly, dropping back into the rickety scrap that held the rough functionality of a chair. Outside, the wind picked up a strong gust, whistling quietly in the cooling night.

And she thought about that, she thought about it so long that Raijin decided to finish his meal though his desire was just as gone as hers. As he carefully cleaned off the plate into a slop bucket she spoke barely above a whisper. 

"Purpose." Her eye on the moon. He stopped, his head flicking around, but when he saw the distant, empty look on her face his question died on his lips. He finished cleaning off his plate, then reached over to pick up her cold food, walked over to where she had sat down next to the door and slid down to sit next to her putting the plate in her lap.

"Well, I'm not gonna let you do it with an empty stomach, y'know?" he said with a beaming smile that coaxed a small one out of her as she picked at the food.

"Dislike." she muttered. "You choosing beggar!" he said, throwing an arm across her shoulders with a laugh.

\-------------

Squall sat at his desk reading the after actions reports, a now familiar activity. It was a slow process, picking over decisions and second guessing everything. He sat across from Xu, Quistis, Selfie, and their latest addition to the SeeD board, Rami. He'd been a cadet in the class behind Squall’s and in the last three years he'd proven himself, and subsequently been pulled from active duty when he lost a leg from about mid-thigh down. Cybernetics didn't play well with guardian force usage, so he'd taken the retirement and been pressed into an administrative role.

"Housekeeping first, Selphie?" Squall said flicking over on his terminal as the others tapped similarly. The waifish woman kept a tight but warm smile on her face, dancing slightly in her seat as she brought up the pertinent details.

"With the payout from the West Galbadian job completion we are in the black for the quarter, hurray!" she said easily as she pulled up some quick summaries for the rest of the table. The meeting had become routine, anything could be if you did it 12 times. There was little enough humor these days, and Selphie provided more than her fair share of cheer.

"Has the team recovered?" Rami asked, looking up toward Squall who shook his head.

"Even with Restore you can't fix amputation. Tina's being retired from active." That pronouncement brought an uncomfortable silence to the group. Losing a SeeD was becoming disturbingly regular.

"There's only ten active SeeD left outside this room until the next graduating class and we're pretty sure there's only one or two likely candidates even then. Unless we relax standards…" Xu started only to see Quistis and Squall sharing the same sour expression, and even Selphie looking fairly green.

"Can we really afford to though?" The bubbly brunette asked softly. "I mean, the jobs are only getting more dangerous, feels like…"

"We're not raising Fodder. We'll have to raise prices and be more selective. I'll step back into active, Selphie you will too. No offense Quistis, but instructors will only be more important going forward to have you reactivated right now. Any objections?" Squall asked smoothly, Xu looked hesitant but she saw the numbers the same as anyone and Rami looked like he'd swallowed a particularly sour bug.

"Twelve then, for the time being, four full teams. Teams one and three are still on long term assignments; we're looking at five contract bids and two teams." Rami commented pulling up the dossiers for consideration.

"We've got another standing request from the Shumi village asking for a clearance team to assist with the ongoing lunar incursion." Rami elaborated. "The pay's still well below average." Selphie shook her head.

"Can't afford to do that or we'll get a shortfall in the next quarter if there's any serious wounds or delays in the mission. East Galbadia's request is far more pressing and pays better, they have the woodlands and the metal mines." Selphie explained pulling up the dossier.

"East Galbadia is definitely viable. What's the status of Timber looking like?" Squall asked, looking to Rami.

"Their independence is pretty assured, East Gal doesn't have the military presence to occupy the state at this point. Not with the West breathing down their necks. Speaking of, I see the West withdrew their request, do we know why?" Rami asked, looking to Xu who frowned.

"No confirmation… but…" she trailed off into an uncomfortable silence. It brooded in the room for a long minute.

"So we agree that the E.G. is our next contract?" Selphie bubbled back into the conversation as the bitterness was just hitting a pitch.

"As long as they haven't lost Sawton." Squall commented dryly, his tone venomous, but not at the fledgeling Galbadian splinter state.

"I'll head the team." Squall volunteered.

"Good luck commander, who're you taking?" Rami asked pulling up the roster.

"Probably Selphie..." Quistis muttered, drawing a chuckle from Xu as Selphie looked her excitable self. Squall gave Quistis the evil eye that she weathered unflappably.

"Whatever. Fine, Selphie, and…" he trailed off looking at the mission dossier.

"Szeth. We could use a more range-oriented compliment." Squall said tapping on the terminal to send an alert to the SeeD to prepare for a mission.

"We'll prepare transit!" Selphie exclaimed as she shot up and veritably sprinted out of the room, as the door closed behind her, the faint sound of "I've got a Mission!" could be heard even through the heavy reinforced doors of executive offices.

"I hope she never changes." Quistis says with a smile as Squall stalked out of the room.

"Let's look into this other team's assignment then, the Centran villages are getting fairly insistent…." she trailed off as the doors closed behind Squall.

Inside, he was celebrating too, he'd taken on one mission in three years and the stress of administration was getting to him, watching other people do the work he'd trained his whole life for was slowly getting on his nerves. He kept his weapon close at hand, he trained daily. Practicing against the monsters of the training center and the local threats whenever the mobile Garden traveled to a staging area not to mention pitting himself against the other SeeD in nearly full contact.

He had never surrendered his stocks of magic from the war three years back, nor had many of the Forces that they had collected on their world spanning nightmare allowed themselves to be placed with others. Unshocking perhaps, considering the proving that many of them had required to consent to be junctioned in the first place.

His personal quarters were much as spartan as they had been. The communication system would have to be hooked up to make outside calls, so they would need to stop in at a dock point to confirm their involvement and the payment. Squall had time to figure out how he wanted to proceed. His old style had waned a bit. He still prefered reinforced clothing, but leather was difficult to repair, he'd transitioned to a lighter cloth material with Galbadian stab resistant fibers woven in, it worked well, and kept the garments from constantly needing to be repaired. He'd opted for pants of the same material. Heavy boots that covered to above his ankle were just sensible for field work, he'd done away with the fur lining it was ostentatious and too hard to keep clean on extended missions. Checking over his equipment he lay out the crystalline Lionheart blade beside the rest of it. Once he was satisfied his tactical gear was set, the inside of the jacket having padded spaces for potions, ammunition, and sundry other items as needed.

He set them out and sat down heavily on his bed, pressing his hands into his eyes. Then pulled them back and looked at the lion ring on his finger bitterly, turning it with his thumb as he considered it. Rinoa, it had started with Rinoa. Sorceress Rinoa had made him Knight, to look after her heart and soul. Too bad it never really worked out for them. He still had the letter he'd found on his bed the day she'd left.

In retrospect he'd seen it coming. The signs were just something he'd been unwilling to see. As her powers settled and the magic swirled around her more and more easily he'd walk in on her with new creatures. The first time it had caused a panic, the fiftieth less so. It was said every Sorceress had a specialty, a power no other had before and no other would have in the same way. Rinoa could create life. It was wondrous, remarkable, even if the creatures were often fairly ugly.

She'd described it as wishing them into existence. She'd have something she wanted to happen and with a bit of willpower a being would appear to do as she wished, not that it vanished afterward. She ended up with a small cloud of creatures waiting on her as she needed. He'd talked to her about it, how the displays of power bothered people around her and how she shouldn't advertise her status. She'd brushed him off with good humor and explained why he shouldn't care. He'd felt enchanted, he'd listened, he'd let it happen even as she grew more distant from their friends.

He was forced to acknowledge it after her first rage. It had been over something small, one of her creatures had taken something belonging to a cadet. Though she had eventually returned it it had become a full blown argument before she did.

It was painful to think about how badly he'd failed. In part because he cared for her, like he hadn't cared for anyone before her really. Every indulgence, every time he let her get away with something, it grew. When her body began to twist it had been the last straw. He'd ignored her helpers for the sake of their feelings, deflected for her excesses to the others. The wings were the last straw. She was so proud of her great feathery wings, she could literally fly with them and was not shy about taking to the air.

The fight had lasted three hours, everything had come up. All the little annoyances, all the differences. Eventually they had come to a stubborn compromise and she had descended from the statue to take his hand, they had slept apart. But the next morning, when he went to talk to her about it, all that had been left of her was a note, and his ring. That was six months after the end of the world.

The disappearances began right after. The jobs Garden was taking on were getting more dangerous, the margins tightening, leave was curtailed frequently. Then a team sent to the Dollet area failed to arrive at rendezvous. In total five teams over eighteen months. Desertion had never before been a problem for Garden. They began cropping up in the employ of warlords and criminals, of the twenty three missing SeeD, eight were accounted for, all of them in body bags. Draw is an unreliable means of removing a GF as any experienced SeeD can tell. No, the only surefire way to contain someone who might be faster on foot than a train, or strong enough to burst through a solid brick wall is elimination.

It was crushing to the Garden's morale. It had been a year and change since the first encounter. It was a mission assessment now, something they looked for and prepared to handle. They'd had to break up their more experienced teams, to ensure that there were combatants rated to be able to deal with the involvement of the so called Bad SeeDs. The acronym BS only made the name more popular, to Xu and Squall's dismay.

Squall withdrew from dwelling on history, they were docked down at Balamb so there was easy access to the East Galbadian State and would almost certainly be traveling via train. Garden's arcane generators and propulsion were ancient and at best poorly understood, the wisdom had been not to strain them with constant movement where possible.

The communications team would already be in negotiation probably. They would be moving out tomorrow if Xu had anything to say about it, and she usually did.

He lay on his bed looking at Lionheart catching the light from his small window. It had only been three years.

His terminal pinged, he glanced over at the wall mounted screen, It read Bid accepted. That was fast. "Offered 30% over initial for expedition, BS confirmed in WG." Well. that changed the calculus. His jaw was tight, coming to grip with some of the deserters himself was a startlingly welcome notion.

"Deploying to Sawton by tomorrow evening for war room. Expedite preparation." Squall stood up and dressed, so much for a rest before moving out. He didn't think he'd be able to sleep much anyway.

\------------------

Swathed in camouflage; a wrap around her face and covering all but her eyes she lay in wait with a team of four commandos. She reached within, holding onto the gentle pulse of magic from the being she shared her body with, It had taken some time after it was ripped away but Pandemona eventually found its way back to her. It had almost been a surprise, and they worked so well together.

She reached into the magic of the wind with only a moment of focus and an invisible blade of air cast out with a tiny susur of hidden motion and the soldier's head neatly came away from his body sliding around his reinforced gorget like, well, wind. The battle was over in moments, four sharpshooters and a Junctioned fighter. Even at five to one odds it was a slaughter.

Surprise and shock took the convoy without issue. The supplies bound for the forward outpost in East Galbadia would never make it. She wiped off her blade. A long, straight, single edged sword. She wiped off the blood from her jacket on the cloth of one of the fallen troopers. It was still jarring to see how mixed the equipment was these days. A few heavy troopers in full combat armor, some even with non-standard reinforcements. Still preferring ranged weapons like assault rifles and sub machine guns over melee tools. Probably the best decision they'd come to. Guns had one big advantage over powered linear frames and that was in the ability to focus on a single target without interfering with each other. She pulled down her face covering picking at the hole in the material. Fast and strong she was, but evasion was a learned skill and being fast enough to dodge a bullet was no guarantee of seeing it fast enough. Another close call in a long line of close calls.

The commandos slipped amongst the bodies securing weapons, ammunition and intact armor, stripping the convoy of anything they could fit in the trucks. She merely climbed into one of the trucks and waited. This was just work. The group she was working for called themselves the Red Geezard Battalion. Former Galbadian army irregulars, a good number of Galbadia Garden cadets and grads working together. They preached about reuniting Galbadia but in practice they mostly were especially effective bandits. Equal opportunity highwaymen. They attacked both east and west troops. She'd never been to their headquarters but she'd been through a few safe houses, as long as she made Gil she gave it little thought. She made a fairly reasonable share of the bounty of each action she was involved in. Today they were pushing into East territory, rumors of a renewed offensive were echoing. There was word that the West had SeeD, probably non-garden SeeD, but even Bad SeeD was SeeD. She was as much one of them by her own reckoning. When the trucks got moving the short range radio crackled and buzzed but she caught the word Sawton. Their destination, a pretty important town to the Eastern Galbadians.

She settled in cradling her arm and her sheathed sword. Digging through her tactical webbing she pulled out a meal bar and chewed quietly while perusing a small printed letter, it had been waiting for her. She read it silently with a small smile on her face. Raijin had his own boat, he'd grown a beard. He looked so little like his old self, the serious tough guy cast to him had faded to an amiable face, lined by exposure and sun. Already dark skinned he was even darker now with a truly massive fish on his line standing pointing at the camera. His letter was long, rambling, and completely syntactically and grammatically fraught. However it was charming, pulling her knees up to her chest, her one eye vicariously experiencing the small trials and minor tribulations of the sea and sun on Fisherman's Horizon; through the rambling stories of the man who was like her brother.

"Changes." she muttered with bitter irony. Three long years fighting other people's fights, She had a dark feeling though. Like as bad as things were, they were about to get a lot worse.


	2. Ambush at Sawton

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wherein worlds collide and a mess is made of everything.

The train system was one of the great gifts Galbadia made for the world. They had the most extensive system of rails of all the continents, and now that it was at war with itself, control of any of the train hubs could easily be the deciding factor of the war. Sawton was one of these hubs. It was the breakpoint that mapped between the former Galbadia Garden location and the axis between Timber and Deling City. It had been a town where logs taken from the area around Garden were processed into more useful lumber, origin of names. Since then it has been a garden town. Farming and agriculture had taken up more of the space and now that Timber was out of Galbadian control it was the source of wood for the eastern Galbadian splinter once again. Squall was fairly certain it called itself the United Galbadian Federation, third name they’d had in three years, the western splinter had more unity in this at least but calling itself the Galbad Empire was a bit grandiose considering it controlled so little actual territory. D-district, and Deling itself were the two major holdings, though that was enough all told. They used the Prison as the real base of operations. It made them nearly unassailable from the ground. 

The eastern confederation was really a number of cities-states that were slowly developing a working relationship. The train let them off, thankfully without serious incident, at the Sawton exit. The smell of fresh cut lumber, fertilizer, animals, and vehicle exhaust was powerful. Squall looked around carefully taking in the small train hub with the loader rails. There wasn’t even really a proper station, just a platform of wood and stone with directing lights for the trains. 

Squall’s kit was a duffel bag stuffed near to bursting; cinched tight to his back to keep himself mobile. Selphie had a large backpack that was taller than she was, almost like a coffin on her back with her Nunchaku poking along the straps ready to be drawn at a moment’s notice. Szeth, their third member, hung a step back carrying a smaller duffle in one hand and a smaller backpack far more reasonable in size. His other hand holding his carrying case for his primary tool. 

Three man teams were fairly standard, enough members to watch out for each other and enough to perform complex tasks as needed without committing too many resources to a single battle. A continuation of Cid’s policies. Squall’s head snapped to an approaching person a second or two before Selphie’s and Szeth’s followed him. The approaching man wore the sharp red of an officer. He even had the full powered linear frame armor and weapon suite that was becoming more popular in the eastern forces. He was accompanied by three squaddies with sporty little rifles that Squall identified as Type 25 Mk 2 autoloading rifles. Semi-automatic, magazine-fed, caseless rifles, chambered heavy to combat armored enemies and local wildlife. Their visors were a little more specialized than the old Galbadian troops for target acquisition. They were followed by an old Doraemon, the GIM47N. Squall turned to face the approaching commander and stepped to the end of the platform as he waved his entourage to a stop behind him. Selphie and Szeth stopped a pace back keeping their eyes out for trouble. 

“You’re commander Squall.” the Eastern Captain said suddenly, pulling to a stop. His voice was fairly level, but the shock none the less obvious.

“Yes.” Squall answered brushing off the celebrity with cool indifference. “I understand you’ve got something of a situation going on that we have a personal interest in.” Squall’s pronunciation was sharp and the Galbadian seemed to shake off his loss of equipoise for a moment. 

“Right. The ongoing western Galbadian expansion. There’s been disturbingly little information coming out of the hit forts, but we’re fairly certain Junctions are involved. Hence the… urgency of our request.” the man said smoothly Squall could just barely hear the servos of the frame moving as he gestured toward the larger buildings set away from the train yard. 

“I am division commander Foltest.” the man said offering one of the massive hands of the enhanced frame without hesitation. Squall took it quickly and gave it a single shake. 

“I am SeeD Commander Squall, these are my team, Selphie and Szeth.” he said, turning his head to see both of them in his peripheral vision. Selphie happily gave a little hop as she was mentioned and waved in a quick motion near her waist and Szeth gave a sharp nod, his face severe.

“Good to have you all aboard. Men! Fall in!” he declared turning back. The Squaddies and their close support platform came jogging up the platform to spread around the SeeD to either side as Foltest turned to walk and talk.

“We have a permanent facility set here. You can see it. The walls are monitored by closed circuit twenty four seven and there’s a minimum of forty men on site at any time, sixty right now. Sadly a lot of them are conscripts, but there’s no helping that right now unfortunately.” the division head confided quietly. Squall filed this information away even as Selphie quietly engaged one of the troops they were walking with in conversation. She’d already wrestled the name of the most popular cantina for the troops in town and directions around the base were already flowing into her well-honed ears. Her charm was reliable. Squall himself was listening as Foltest told him about the local tactical situation. They were still pretty far from the front lines here, but nothing was certain, especially with the Red Geezard. 

“You’ve mentioned this Geezard group a few times now, I’m guessing you’re not talking about the monster?” Squall asked as they stepped into the base’s command structure, a concrete block of a building with an emplaced weapons nest at the top. 

“The Red Geezard Battalion. They claim to be a group that stands up for the common folk of Galbadia. Mostly formed of deserted Garden recruits, former soldiers, and various sympathetic riff-raff. I’d like to say they’re little more than bandits, but they have a little too much success to dismiss them. As though we needed another destabilizing force right now. We’ve heard through the grapevine that they've recently been striking logistical trains in the west, likely gearing up for something, but Hyne knows what honestly. If they’re content to deal with the Royalists then I say have at.” the commander said with an obscene gesture aimed roughly to the west. 

Inside the building was not unusual, grated floors, bare walls, the smell of anti-corrosion paint, cleaning solution, and stale coffee permeated the air. Selphie’s nose wrinkled, and she whispered something to one of the Squaddies, now two of them were talking with her in hushed tones. Foltest seemed disinclined to comment on it so Squall also ignored the minor breach of protocol. They made their way into what was clearly a command suite. Maps draped the walls with markers and notes pinned to them, men and women sat at consoles taking advantage of the bare functionality of radio systems. A man portable set could get just barely powerful enough to be heard over the echoes of The Scream, in a decade or two the airwaves should be completely clear. Until then, communication was still difficult and only reliable with hard wired connections. Still through the static they seemed to have a decent connection. Must not have been too far out. 

Squall broke in on brass tacks and sat down with Foltest who removed his helmet. He was a close cut man in his thirties if Squall was the judge. Even though the man was easily ten years his senior he didn’t talk down to him like some military men he’d met with. They got assigned a space in the local barracks, with some measure of privacy. Squall dismissed Selphie and Szeth with his bag to follow their guide and get things set away. Selphie returned about half an hour later with a small plate of finger food setting it on the table as she explored around the room like a kid in a candy shop. The two commanders ignored her as she wasn’t really bothering anyone despite her bubbly persona. 

They’d hashed out a plan in the meantime and were talking over details. The plan was to use SeeD as a mobile reserve to be committed to making a push through and taking one of the Western towns near the nominal border between them. A little ground gained would mean a lot. If however there was an appearance of Juncitoners somewhere they would immediately divert to that battlefield. Removing those kinds of assets was deeply in both their interests.

It was decided that they would be moving out tomorrow, to make the most of their time. Squall followed Selphie back to their shared bunkroom to tell them about what was going on. Making a lot of moves was pretty standard to SeeD on missions so he wasn’t concerned about them having unpacked too much or anything like that. He found Szeth in their space, having opened his weapon’s case and was going over it physically. 

He was a rare breed of SeeD. Most prefered to operate with a melee weapon and rely on magical prowess for ranged options. Szeth was a bow specialist. His junctions emphasising perception, strength and speed. The bow he held was likely completely unmovable to an unaugmented human. The commander with his powered frame might be able to use it. Probably not with the skill of its owner though. Bows provided a huge advantage once one understood them, being able to use variable warheads. Even without special loads a mundane broadhead or bodkin arrow was capable of doing tremendous damage; outstripping even some firearms while maintaining near absolute silence. He had some skill in hand-to-hand combat, primarily focused in evasion and creating distance to use his bow to devastating effect; his magical repertoire also reinforced this. He’d seen the man fight, using shaping to create bursts of fire and blasts of air to push away attackers. He had skills that might be necessary. A fairly large amount of space in his hand bag was devoted to ammunition. A bow that powerful was best paired with specially made ammunition. Probably the biggest weakness of the weapon. 

Magically he wasn’t as good at shaping as Selphie, whose skills were completely beyond what either of her teammates were capable of. Selphie was their magical specialist. Despite a relatively later introduction to Junction through her transfer she’d become competent, though she still treated magical resources as a primary engagement tool. He’d seen her do things with magic he’d have claimed were impossible the second before she did it. Flame blades, blizzard walls, Ball Thunder barrages. She was a genius with magic simply put. As much trash talk as Quistis and Xu had given him about his decision, the war alone proved they made a good team and understood each other. Szeth was a rogue element for now but they’d come together soon enough he was sure of it. 

He closed the door to their bunk room and looked over to Selphie who glanced at Szeth who offered a thumbs up and a small nod turning over the wallet-sized non-linear junction detector in his hands. 

“We’re clean commander, no bugs.” Szeth said quite softly.

“Alright, so assume there’s only one or two.” Squall responded in almost a whisper.

Selphie for her part stifled a giggle, as Szeth frowned.

“Those things aren’t infallible.” Squall mentions and Szeth concedes the point with a small shrug before putting it back in his pack. “Anyway. Broad overview is we’re roaming reserve, attached to a mechanized infantry unit for rapid redeploy. Our mission parameter is assisting in the capture of the city of Travon from the empire’s forces. However, our actual first priority is to neutralize any rogue SeeD, any means necessary. Interrupt any other action and respond to GF sighting or obvious junction-user involvement. Additionally, any important information goes through me before handing it over to the Galbadians. Protect it if you have to, make up an excuse. Remember, the Easterners are our employers, they’re not necessarily big fans of us any more than the people we’re here to fight. Understood?” He said while looking between Selphie and Szeth still speaking as quietly as he felt he could get away with. The former plastering on a very serious face that almost looked comical and giving him a stern thumbs up. Szeth made eye contact and gave a firm nod. 

“Understood, commander.” Szeth said softly, prompting Selphie to bounce a step forward.

“Yeah! Got it! Fer’sure!” adding a second thumbs up, bringing Szeth’s most guardedly skeptical expression slinking to his face though it vanished when she looked his way. 

“Good, Szeth, Sephie grabbed food for us when we were with Foltest, did you get anything to eat?” The commander asked him. The man ran his fingers over his shaved head. “No, I should probably though. I didn’t eat on the train either…” he trailed off looking toward the door.

“Nerves?” Squall asked seriously. The younger SeeD cringed slightly and looked anywhere but Squall, though on landing on Selphie she hopped a step forward and patted him on the back, leaning down to look at his face with an unguarded expression.

“A little, I guess. It’s… well. You chose me.” he said putting his hand on his chest. Squall nodded.

“Your record is good, and you fit the gap.” Squall said simply, flatly.

Szeth looked at Squall’s shoes for a second before seeming to come to some sort of decision. 

“Either of you want anything?” he asks standing up Selphie steps up so they’re shoulder to bicep. The shorn SeeD standing an inch taller even than Squall, he looked down as she smiled up at him.

“Yep, still hungry, let’s go!” she says and takes long exaggerated steps toward the door humming a tuneless song. Szeth just looks at Squall who flashes a momentary smirk.

“Yes, she’s always like this.” He says, prompting her to spin on heel, fists on her hips, cheeks puffed out in offense.

“Hey!” she squawked. Squall let out a quiet chuckle as Szeth goggled quietly.

\---------------------

Night had fallen, it was just after sunset, before proper moonrise. Fujin breathed slow steady breaths in the cool spring air of the woods around Sawton, wishing she had time for an indulgence before it all went down. The attack would begin any moment, on signal from the close support weapons team. The goal was to destroy the train switching station so they couldn’t be quickly followed and escape with a supply locomotive in the north western rail before the full weight of the garrison fell on them. 

She took a deep breath wringing her hands on the hide-bound hilt of her fourth sword. This one was a similar design to the Galbadian infantry swords popular through most of the last forty years. She darkened the blade to kill its lustre to emphasize the advantage of darkness. She controlled her breathing, eyes searching the darkness for patrolling teams. Picking out her approach in the dark killing field heading up to the outer wall of the fortified town. Decent from the shelf overlooking the town had been ruled out, too rough and too exposed. They’d have to make it across the open space to the town fast, not an issue for her. Her Guardian force surged like a winding breeze on an open plain, filling her with the push to move, to dance the breeze again. Soon.

The sound of backblast reached her just after the flash of the rocket launchers. Four rockets aimed at the wall landing near the base and successfully opening three holes in the wall, the last one had listed high and wouldn’t be accessible to unassisted troopers, which most of the Red Geezards were. She however could make the hop easily. It was only about five feet off the ground. She waited for the charge to the holes to commit before taking a deep breath and doing what her training and experience prepared her to do. She took the open land at a run, a dark streak against a dark field as she soared with each step. Making it two hundred meters in a few dozen heartbeats. She leapt over the failed breach and into the town beyond. Spotting a patrol starting to move toward the holes with a close support Doraemon she reached within, grabbed a tornado and with an exhalation and a sweep of her hand sent them spinning off their feet and flying a dozen feet to land in a heap spread amongst the detritus of the trainyard.

Her job was purely disruption and interdiction. She sped past the fallen striking out toward the base, aiming to spread more havoc while there was still confusion about what was happening. She used wind and gravity magic to twist and disperse formation fighting. It wasn’t until the bullets started flying toward her that she sought cover. Her first clue was what was likely to be quite the bruise in the middle of her chest, nearly in line with her heart. Her armor accepted a great deal of the force and spread it around. But if her flesh hadn’t had a toughness roughly in line with a rock she would unquestionably have been dead. 

As it was the bullet twisted her halfway around and caused her to stumble even as she used the motion to twist her into a roll heading for cover of a stack of rail ties her return fire was literal fire. A burst of flames from what cover she had heard the report of the rifle. Type 25’s for sure. Definitely something she wanted to keep from the harder fight. Taking stock behind the ties for a second she called up a spell and a sheath of energy covered her, it wouldn’t stop everything, but protection was protection and it would at least slow down her becoming a broken mess if she took something meaner than small arms fire. Even small arms was dangerous though, as the throbbing pain in her chest could attest. She didn’t have the most powerful magical reserve and her junction wasn’t ideal but she’d work with what she had. 

Sucking in a deep breath she rocketed out of cover aiming to close some with the shooters her hand darting down to close on a thin disk, safe on the inside, razor along the edges. Smaller chakram were more handy than her larger one had been. she raised one up to her ear and gave it a hurl with a grunt of effort. Throwing weapons were a SeeD’s best friend in many circumstances, leveraging their monstrous strength and inhuman capability. In this case the whistling razor she threw found its mark and there was a scream of pain. She’d aimed for the center of mass, even in the darkness she’d picked out another soldier drawing a bead on her and had, by the sound of it hit her mark. He was at minimum doing quite badly, she could throw those sharpened rings through anacondaur hide, light body armor was no challenge. Now however more small arm fire was coming toward her, so she called upon the winds again, grabbing all the detritus and debris of the trainyard into a great swirling cloud of a smokescreen as she pushed up toward them. 

Speed was her greatest ally right now. Communication could only happen so fast amongst her opponents and the chaos of the full scale engagement happening to the side of her as the Geezards handled the troopers coming from the town square and whatever patrols were in the trainyard itself as she fought along the edge of it. Leaping over her cover she was amongst them, her blade lashing out, not to kill, though she certainly did when required, but to maim and wound. Her calculus was somewhat callous, they would have to help the wounded and corpses would need no more than a glance. So she left a swath of grievous injury in her wake, arms lopped half off, legs broken with a kick. She took her fair share of return fire. A half dozen more bruises joined the first as she fought. Magic aiming to concuss and poison rather than diving in for the kill she would move on when they didn’t immediately fire back, after nearly two minutes she was holding her own with careful balance against the defenders, biding the time the team needed to do what they had to. 

Then something changed. Her instincts screamed at her and she whipped her blade in front of her trying to hide behind the flat of the rather deep, heavy infantry sword. It probably did save her life, even through the protect as the…. Arrow? Impacted her blade and detonated. The sword shattered like glass and the shrapnel left her side and arms a mess of weeping cuts and scrapes. Left holding half a sword she nearly jumped out of her skin when a great glowing arc whipped at her through the gloom of the tornado’s wake. She thrust her sword in the way and felt the impact all the way in her spine as she was lifted from the ground and tossed like a sack of potatoes, not by the impact but the ringing blast of the energy the instant after impact. 

Only one force in the world used Gunblades. Only one man in the world wielded a gunblade like a shard of moonlight given shape she’d been on the receiving end of it before. He was upon her in a flash. Her warding swing with half a sword parried with the aplomb of a master. She threw herself out of the way of a side kick aimed at her gut that followed. 

Squall Leonhart.

A shiver roared down her spine that had nothing to do with the impact of his gunblade on her pitiful protection as he stepped into her guard and cinched with her.

“Surrender now!” he growled as his eye caught hers. As it did his eyes went wide. 

“Fujin?” he gasped and the pressure lessened for an instant letting her plant her feet and push with a roar of effort before turning to run. Even as her feet left the ground something gripped her. She pushed as hard as she could against it, reaching deep within for the only answer to the high magic she felt. She was moving through molasses as the world whipped around her Squall righted himself and was in front of her. The impact of the flat of his blade on her wrist sent tendrils of agony through her. The bones of a human wrist can only take so much punishment, even with the assistance of a demigod-like being. 

The next swing was interrupted as she finally managed a blast of Aero trying to create some breathing room. The winds sliced at his reinforced clothing sending him skidding back, shielding his eyes in fast forward. It did no good however as an arrow passed through her thigh, drawing a scream as she started to collapse only for both her legs and one of her arms to suddenly be trapped in a flash freeze that gripped her to the ground, holding her in a half fall even as it sealed her in place. She dropped the half blade as the Slow spell wore off and things snapped back to normal pace with a flail wielding short woman stepped out of the darkness beside a man with another arrow knocked in a powerful looking compound bow, the string pulled back and sighted at her chest. 

“Bad SeeD secured, commander!” the small brunette woman, Selphie Tilmett, chirped. Squall shook off the disorientation just as the sound of a train locomotive sounded and the trainyard was rocked by explosions. Throwing the young woman from her feet and staggering the Commander into a streetlamp. The bow-SeeD let the arrow fly by accident as she pitched over from the blast. The only thing that stopped Fujin from a similar fate was the literal anchor of the ice to the ground.

Fujin’s breath came in chattering gasps as the cold seeped quickly into her body. Even with her enhanced physiology she could only take so much. A potentially career ending injury to her leg, numerous bone deep bruises with the possibility of internal bleeding, and a completely smashed wrist aside, she felt her vision narrowing as the adrenaline in her blood fought the oncoming shock. Her heart hammered in her chest, every beat threatening to jump out of her mouth. She looked around wildly with her one eye and tried to pull herself out of the ice with a gasp of shocking pain that cut through the haze of numbing ice. It made her nearly vomit and swallow a scream in the same instant. 

Squall looked toward the departing locomotive with his gunblade held at his side. The other two stepped up, Selphie raising her nunchaku with an air of concentration as the bowman aimed higher.

“Commander?” Tilmett asked sharply.

“Let it go. The damage is done and we don’t know what’s out there waiting for us. We have something more important to deal with.” he said, turning around his gunblade held at his side as he stared at Fujin. Her breath was coming in gasps now, having to swallow quickly as she felt like her throat was closing. Her vision wavered, but she fought oncoming unconsciousness. He stopped just out of arm’s reach.

“Put her under.” Squall said, locking eyes with her. Tilmett made a noise of assent and then Fujin’s consciousness vanished like a snuffed flame.

\---------------------

When she awoke it was in chains. Her magic felt distant, barely a whisper where normally it screamed beneath the surface. She was bound hand and foot, underground, stripped to her undershirt and underpants. The first few minutes were a gasping struggle. She’d fought against her bindings, only to let out a shriek as she jostled the light splint around her wrist. 

The agony caused a spasm of her legs and that was twice again the shock as the bandages on her leg started to feel wet from within. As the tears rose and fell her eyelid fluttered laying on her side on the stone floor. It took only a moment for her to gather her wits about her and take stock. Her eye closed and she dove within herself to feel nothing. She let out a short keening cry and let her forehead rest on the cold ground. No wonder everything hurt so badly, but also no real surprise. She’d had her magic reserves and Force drawn out of her. 

She gently rolled onto her back and looked at the chains binding her arms and legs together on short chains then around at the cell she found herself in. No windows, no clocks. One entire wall was heavy iron bars and a door with a slot in it at the bottom. A prison then. She took a deep breath and tried to sit up, finding she could but it was quite difficult. Her head was spinning, her guts felt like she’d been turned inside out and then stuffed back into her own skin. 

Laying back on the cold stone she flexed the fingers of her good hand. Her breaths came harsh but she quickly got them under her control and closed her eye to think. She wasn’t dead, so they obviously wanted her alive. Squall had had every opportunity to execute her if that was the goal, so obviously that wasn’t the goal. At least not yet. She probably had a fair amount to answer for. She smiled ruefully to herself for just a moment. 

She considered her career. Caravaneer guard in Trabia, monster hunter in Esthar, Courier in Galbadia, Bodyguard in Deling. Wetwork in the western Galbad Empire, organized crime enforcer in the eastern states, from there falling in with the Geezards… Not the most Illustrious career, though she knew SeeD was just as dirty.

All there was to do now was wait. She looked outside the cell into the gloom, lit by soft sodium bulbs, casting everything in a soft orange luminescence. No clock, no windows, no people. No way to tell the day or the hour. She lay back down and closed her eye. No point in doing anything else, she wasn’t going to get anywhere on a severely injured leg with a broken wrist only loosely controlled. She needed serious medical attention or powerful magical healing soon but nothing was critical. Stable. That’s the word for her situation. 

\---------------------

“Fujin Laskota, Cadet Number 44527-193.” Her eyes snapped open. She turned her head where it was laying on the stone floor to look toward the bars of her cell. Standing in the golden gloom was SeeD Commander Squall Leonhart. She let out a huff and struggled to sit up and turn to face him, trying to move her legs as little as possible but wincing all the same. He stared down at her with his flinty pale blue eyes a sharp contrast to her vibrant but dulled red.

“Commander.” She said in a voice that was two parts parched croak, one part exhausted, and three parts resigned. They stared at each other through the bars, a strange mockery of their time in D-District years ago.

“You are in Garden’s custody. I have questions for you. Are you prepared to answer them to the best of your ability, cadet?” Squall asked in a tone that was unusually soft for him, formal, sure, and dispassionate but softer than she remembered his voice being.

She hung her head for a moment, her shock of shoulder length white-silver hair falling across her face as she let out a sigh before flicking her head up to clear it again.

“Yes, commander” She said truthfully. There really was no other option, it’s not like she’d survive much longer as she was, might as well give in, she had nobody left to protect really. Well, that wasn’t true, Raijin was alive and well. But he’d given up his junctions and put down his staff for a rod. She doubted they were interested in him now. 

She’d heard through the grape vine of the so-called Bad SeeD that had been cropping up the last few years. She’d never personally run into one, but she had been mistaken for one a few times already. Just whispers, just hints as she traveled. She had been studious in keeping a low profile, Staying out of the big conflicts, until the Geezards got a handle on her anyway.

“Good.” Squall intoned as he pulled a key from his armored jacket and opened her cell. She started, jostling her legs and almost laying herself out as she took a sharp hissing breath, her teeth snapping audibly together as her eye snapped closed. She opened her eye a moment later to find Squall had lifted a small chair into the cell and closed the door behind him, she saw him slip the key into his pocket.

She got control of her breathing and her heart rate as he waited, sitting with his elbows on his knees, hands dangling.

“Let’s get started then.” he said reaching into his other pocket and pulling out a small metal bottle, offering it out to her on her functional side. She hesitated only a moment before taking to cold metal, setting it on the ground and trying to open it with her good hand, after a little trial and error she got it open and brought it to her lips. Water. Sweet water, she had to stop herself from drinking herself sick, taking gasping breaths as she drained much of the bottle in the first moments.

\---------------------

“She killed a dozen of my men, Commander.” Foltest said in a voice thick with venom. 

“Eight of them will survive. That said as per our contract, Garden retains rights to all former garden faculty found in the field, regardless of state or circumstances. Your leadership signed the paperwork, she’s mine to do with as I want.” Squall said, his hands folded on the table. The aftermath of the attack had been nothing short of chaos. An entire train full of food and supplies had been stolen as it was waiting to unload. The train switching station was in ruins from a half dozen explosives. 

The damage was almost incalculable as any action taken would delay the offensive that had been planned by at least days, probably weeks. There was no point taking new territory when you didn’t have a ghost of a chance of keeping it, and without the rails there was no good way to move the kind of material and manpower occupation required. Foltest was looking for a scapegoat, that much was obvious. Squall was sure that the leadership of the Federation was breathing down his neck. 

“Fucking very well, Commander.” The Galbadian’s voice dripped his anger. His armor was dented and his uniform torn in the fighting. Neither of them had come out particularly well from a PR perspective. Squall though, had what he really wanted. Fujin. Just thinking about her brought all kinds of implications to the table. “She’s your problem, so get her out of my brig before the men take it into their own hands.” he said crumpling up a paper and petulantly hurling it into the corner. 

“As soon as we’re able, have you received any information from the Federation?” He asked coolly. Foltest pulled off his helmet and pounded it on the table leaving a dent. 

“They accept your suggestion. Your contract is terminated at this time, the partial refund is good enough.” the man said growling out the words in a resigned voice. A little of the bitterness leaking off to his normal poise. 

“The invasion is canceled, we’ll be in touch.” He said looking up at Squall, brown eyes meeting blue and holding for several seconds before the men shared a nod and Squall stepped out of the hurricane of the command center. He started to head back to the barracks but impulsively turned to head toward the brig. He had things he needed to know and there was only one person who could answer him. A deserter, a traitor, and an enemy combatant for the Second Sorceress War. Though he remembered well enough the end of it. How Fujin had broken rank in a way she never had before to ask his team for their help. The way Seifer had brushed her off and fought on. The way she’d run to him after he lost their duel and they pushed on to face Adel. 

Stepping into the brig he walked through security with hardly an interruption stepping underground past the drunks and the petty criminals to the last cell. He pulled the cell key from his pocket, where he had requisitioned the cell for Garden use. 

He paused and collected himself looking at the disheveled woman laying on the floor, a year younger than him, but she looked as old as he felt in many ways her face was deeply lined with dirt. Her fine silver-white hair falling around her in a tiny halo on the cold cement of the cell. The medical aid that had been done by Selphie had been deliberately bare bones. Better to keep her injured if she were inclined to fight. In sleep she was relaxed. She still had a slender build but the girlishness had mostly faded out of her, left in its place was the controlled form of a fighter, only the barest definition on her torso, her arms and legs were cords of muscle and well marbled fat. 

He thought about how he wanted to begin, he settled on something that would be the most telling, formal address.

“Fujin Laskota, Cadet Number 44527-193.” he intoned neutrally as she started awake, her eye flicked open and she stiffly turned her head to consider him. Her eye was dull, the fire that usually accompanied it almost completely guttered, ever small motion of her injured wrist or leg brought a tiny wince, slight hisses, stifled gasps. She had never looked so beaten, even after literally beating her twice during the war she’d always had enough strength to retreat, to act. To see her so diminished was pitiable. He didn’t let the direction of his thoughts show.

“Commander.” The way she grumbled the word sounded almost painful, but it was a heartening show of respect. She looked like she was expecting him to announce her execution. He decided to dispel that notion for now.

“You are in Garden’s custody. I have questions for you. Are you prepared to answer them to the best of your ability, cadet?” He asked. Calling her Cadet almost seemed laughable. She’d been a commander in the Galbadian army. She’d fought the war every bit as much as he right up until Time Compression. It was almost a joke. Though the look on her face told him that if she thought so as well, it wasn’t funny to her.

“Yes, Commander.” her voice was hoarse, pained. She even blinked slowly. As though the effort to sharpen herself was simply too much. He found himself regretting that he hadn’t thought to request a meal brought down to her, but he had no way of knowing how cooperative she was going to be and let the thought go.

“Good.” he settled on responding with, then pulled the key from his pocket, as he did he saw her eye go wide and she started scrambling to face him more fully. He grabbed a chair from the hall and took it into the cell with him, closing the gate behind him almost as an afterthought as she recovered from her sudden movement. Her body was trembling and he strongly considered casting curative magic until she mastered the reaction a moment later and resumed staring up at him with her banked ember eye. He slumped into the chair, feeling tired already.

“Let’s get started then.” she said reaching into his pocket for the water bottle he’d grabbed for himself. He was a little thirsty, but it felt cruel to taunt her by taking a drink first. He handed the bottle to her and watched her eye suspiciously rove it, then him. She ended up having to place it in the crook of her knee and awkwardly twist with one hand to open it. She must have been worse off than he’d suspected because he watched her gulp at the water like a woman dying of thirst. After she looked back to him with a little of her fire returned he gave her a nod and spoke.

“Cadet you have a lot to answer for, but we’ll start here. Raijin and Seifer, are they also with the Brigade?” He asked his eyes narrowing as he searched her. She deflated before his eyes, seeming to shrink into herself.

“No.” she said simply, her voice a whisper, though it had lost some of the harshness of its edge.

“Where are they, then?” He asked immediately, the three of them had never been apart further than they absolutely needed to be as far as he remembered all the way through Garden and the war. 

“Raijin…. Retired.” she said and he nearly scoffed, but she wasn’t finished.

“Seifer…” her lips formed a line, and her eye focused past him, seemingly lost in thought. 

“Pandora.” Squall heard the word and his followup question about Raijin vanished. Lunatic Pandora was a ruin. An absolutely destroyed wreck. Clearly the two others had made it off together, so for Seifer to still be there could only mean one thing. He had to know.

“You mean to say that Seifer Almasy is dead?” he asked nearly rising out of his chair, so far forward had he leaned. She hung her head. It was almost a formality to hear her say the word.

“Yes.” Her voice a harsh whisper, loaded with feelings he found he could empathize with, to an extent. The silence in the cell became deafening, strangling.

“So…” he started, then stopped. He had to collect himself and after a moment tried again.

“So why are you here?” he asked his eyes boring into hers as they slowly wandered up to meet his.

“Gil... “ she started then seemed to think better. Her hand gripped air a moment, her fist so tight it shook with the effort. Some of the fire in her eye returned then, and he glimpsed the woman she was three short years ago.

“PURPOSE.” she said, in that moment he recognized her.


	3. Reorganization

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updated 01/07/20 for continuity error correction.

Squall collected the other two SeeD and sat them down on their packed bags, ready to move out but he’d forestalled them.

“What’s this about, Squall?” Selphie asked her head tilted curiously, Szeth listened placidly. Sitting still where Selphie tapped her heels impatiently.

“Cadet Laskota.” Squall answered swiftly but then paused to collect his thoughts, he started speaking just as Sephie’s mouth was opening to say something.

“She’s in a situation and despite appearances I feel she’s not one of the rouge agents we were seeking. Well, not exactly. As you both know I went down to interrogate her before we had to move her. She’s cooperative. There’s more details but that can all wait for the return to Garden. The important parts here is she is to be considered an AWOL cadet, not an enemy combatant. That’s within my discretion.” He said looking at Selphie, who had a bewildered look about her.

“But didn’t you say, about D-district…” Squall cut her off with a look.

“She has much to answer for, but she’s not Seifer. Is my directive clear?” her face smoothed back over and she nodded, as did Szeth.

\----------------

The walk up the line to the next train station was arduous with an unjunctioned person with them slowing them down. They could have run it in a few hours but not carrying their full kit plus another person, especially not a person in handcuffs with a freshly healed wound.

Magic can do a lot of good for a person but perfectly healing wounds was tricky in the best of conditions and they didn’t exactly have the best of conditions. Still, Selphie proved herself again getting the AWOL cadet walking in a single cast of a high intensity cure spell. The walk was quiet but for the occasional harassment by an opportunistic monster which was quickly dispatched. There were few creatures roaming the world that frightened a seasoned SeeD, let alone three and only one was even regularly on the continent. Marlboros tended to keep to the forests, thankfully.

Standing at the train station for the former galbadia garden location they spoke very little only enough to communicate about making a banked fire to wait for the next one to come down the line near dawn. Squall decided to take the last watch, from 0300 till whenever. He sat listening to the darkness looking up at the sky frequently to the slowly fading endless sea of stars and nebulae. It was a breathtaking view, one he privately enjoyed a little less with the memory of being in space himself. That however was behind him. His head turned as their “captive” stirred and eventually sat up looking around in the dark and finding him only with seeming difficulty.

“Time?” she asked softly, barely a whisper. Her voice was much smoother when she wasn’t sharply enunciating. Squall glanced down at his watch.

“0440.” he answered similarly quietly. The other two seemed content to sleep through their hushed conversation.

“Damn.” she muttered, carefully laying back to stare at the sky. He didn’t comment, letting the darkness fill the void of conversation. It wasn’t an awkward feeling, which was refreshing. He heard her patting around her torn combat jacket and pulling something small out of a pocket. Fiddling with it one handed for a few moments then letting out a deep sigh.

“Lighter?” she said and Squall was confused before he looked more closely and saw a small cardboard box of Deling Special Blend - Filtered being wiggled where he could see them.

“I didn’t know you smoked.” he said curiously, and she flopped her hand back to her chest.

“Calm.” she commented and he considered what she meant.

“Fair enough.” he said quietly and patted the breast of his jacket, he pulled a waterproof lighter he’d used to light their campfire tinder with. It could be done with magic, but there wasn’t a great reason to tap reserves for something that could be done mundanely. He nearly silently stood up as she shuffled one of the smokes into her lips and he obligingly struck the lighter for her while she puffed the stick to life with a smoldering red cherry at the end.

In the cool of pre-dawn on the empty Galbadian plain the soft scent of dew and earth was interrupted by the sharp smell of smoke mixed with a warm spicy flavor, that settled into a cold feeling that settled in the back of his tongue. He coughed quietly from his accidental breath, she turned her head to blow the smoke out the side of her mouth keeping her eye on him.

“Thanks.” to which he nodded and moved to sit back down listening to the quiet sound of her breathing and the sputtering, crackling pop of the herbal inhalant. The smell of the smoke lingered on his tongue numbing where it settled. They sat in this relative silence as the horizon slowly gathered color.

“Regrets.” Squall’s head snapped around and he looked at her as she stared at the nearly depleted smoke.

“I think we all have some, looking back.” Squall muttered diplomatically. But it was more true than he liked to admit. There was still a stab whenever something reminded him of Rinoa. They’d only been together for a few years but their shared experience had paled out everything before it. After with her slow growth of power and… disconnection. He was drawn out of his memories as something very light impacted his jacket and bounced into his lap. Fujin was watching him, her arm falling back to her lap where her other one was splinted and resting. He looked down to find the box of Deling Specials innocently staring back up at him.

“Calm.” she whispered and he huffed quietly, his instinctive frown giving way to a rueful smile. He tossed the box back, and she shrugged and tucked it away. He had seen people try inhalants for the first time and end up a coughing mess. The last thing he wanted was to wake up the other two with a coughing fit.

“Thanks, no thanks.” he replied as she snubbed out the stick in the dirt, and flicked it away. she lay back down on the ground, putting her good arm under her head to keep it off the ground but didn’t close her eye.

“War?” her soft voice asked.

“After.” he answered after consideration.

“Sorceress?” she pressed and he sighed, that frown returning full force.

“Rinoa…” he said and closed his eyes tightly to banish her face from his mind’s eye.

“Understand.” she commented, he was about to comment about it but considered. Seifer and Rinoa really did have a lot in common in some ways. They just wore it differently. Self-assurance, confidence, good looks, all in abundance. He looked appraisingly at Fujin who was still placidly staring back at him.

“How…” Squall started, then took a moment to consider, looking the pale woman in the eye as he thought.

“She approached him first, you know.” Squall eventually said. And Fujin blinked slowly, in a way he took for assent.

“They really had a lot in common. Looking back. Confidence, surety…” he started only to be interrupted.

“Arrogance.” she commented wryly. He snorted out a laugh involuntarily.

“You said it, not me.” that wry smirk coming back as it slowly mirrored on her face.

“...were you involved in the Trelain incident in west Galbadia?” he asked, suddenly looking at her. It had been an early incident in the civil war, a small town wiped off the map, its thousand population either killed or scattered in the aftermath. Garden hadn’t been involved in the conflict seriously at that point; they had dropped off after the first year of the conflict to deal with their internal issues and focus more on stabilizing Trabia. It had been called a stalemate by both sides more or less, when neither of them wanted to claim ashes. It was suspected that Juncitoned individuals had been involved on both sides. Their bodies hadn’t been recovered before they had been buried and the survivors had vanished shortly after.

“...No. Deling.” she said solemnly. He didn’t know whether he was relieved or disappointed. Having some idea of which rogues had been involved would have been a big boon.

“Good. That was ugly. Saw the aftermath…” he said looking out into the darkness.

“Worse.” she said softly.

“Do you…” he started to ask, their eyes meeting and he looked away first. The look in her face was a bit too raw to finish that question.

“You know you’re going to be debriefed. We’re going to ask about everything. No matter how painful. Or personal.” he says with some resignation lilting the edges of the statement.

“YES.’ she said with that same solid surety he was used to with her.

\----------------

The dawn came about ninety quiet, contemplative minutes later. Szeth stirred first, gently prodding Selphie was enough to wake her as well. They were up and ready when the train pulled in for them to board back toward Balamb.

They occupied the SeeD reserved compartment. Selphie immediately finding a place to stand to watch the windows as they rode along. Szeth for his part laid back down on the couch in the compartment and was asleep again within minutes. Squall found himself sitting in the compartment disassembling his lionheart and inspecting it for battle damage and cleaning the cylinder.

Fujin had decided the bed was the best place to be and was laying with her head hanging off the end, her boots resting at the edge of the bed neatly as she considered Szeth and Squall upside down. He’d considered asking her about it but decided she wouldn’t do something if it was uncomfortable or painful. He was slowly building a new impression of the taciturn albino.

He’d never really interacted with her much without Seifer around. The three of them had been essentially inseparable. The thought was a sad one. He only realized he’d been staring when her voice jarred him out of his reverie.

“QUESTION.” she stated and his face firmed. He’d been caught, no use pretending she wasn’t on his mind.

“Do you miss them?” he asked and before he decided that he needed to clarify she responded.

“ALWAYS.” she spoke with her voice thick.

“...in that cell, you said you’d struck out to find purpose… did you ever find it?” with that question she was quiet for an entire minute then rolled over to her stomach and rested her face on the edge of the bed. It was another minute before she raised it back up and he was struck by how terribly beaten she looked in that moment.

“NO.” she answered, it was the last words they shared before they transitioned underwater toward Balamb.

\----------------

They had made it into Balamb without incident and one of the SeeD armored vehicles was waiting for them outside the train station. They piled in quickly, but the whispers had already started in the train station. Squall was annoyed by the lack of operational security about the whole thing, but it was probably unavoidable. Afterall Fujin and Raijin had been in charge of the occupation of the town for the day or so it had been under Galbadian control. Her being recognized had been almost unavoidable.

Glancing back she did look quite different than she had three years ago. Her hair was longer, falling to her shoulders in a wave, cut unevenly, possibly she’d cut it herself. Her skin was ghostly pale with barely a flush of life about her like all the passion had been drained out of her. Her hair was a lustreless silver like an old woman, probably months since she’d last had shampoo. Her face was set in a near perpetual frown as if in disgust of the world around her exacerbated by the absence of what little baby fat she’d had a few years back. The only thing that had not changed was her choice of eyepatch and harsh manner of speech. Somehow he noticed that they were the same height; he was looking her almost exactly in the eye. It was surreal to be examining her as she examined him back, sitting across from one another in the armored carrier. 

“Gonna be nice to be home. Even if we only did, like, half a mission at most.” Selphie chirped. Tapping her feet to a tune only she could hear.

“We’ll see what comes of it.” Squall commented while Szeth leaned into his hand staring at the bulkhead of the vehicle’s wall. Squall considered a few moments before speaking up toward him.

“Good work out there, Szeth.” he said and the shorn-headed young man blinked out of his funk to sit up straighter.

“Uhm.” he started his mouth moving before his brain had fully caught up with what was said.

“Thank you, commander?” he replied after a moment. Squall nodded to him and Szeth seemed to accept that he wasn’t going to get more out of it and remained sitting up straight. However the set of his face had changed, still contemplative, but some of the roughness had gone out of it. All through Fujin’s eye was darting around following the conversation with as little movement as she could manage. Nobody seemed to want to speak to her, and she was similarly disinclined, even without fetters she was still a captive.

They pulled into Garden about half an hour later, the air in the armored vehicle managed to be fairly light, despite the abortive mission. Pulling into the garage on the resettled Balamb Garden they pulled in and were met by a detail of Garden Faculty. The three SeeD stepped out with their fourth positioned in the middle of them.

“Welcome home commander, shall we take the cadet into custody?” one of them asked casually. Squall glanced at Fujin who met his gaze stoically.

“I’ll take her to the debrief.” he said and the members nodded, stepping out of the way. Squall nodded to Selphie who took a hopping step forward and nearly flew into the Garden proper. Szeth was more sedate and nodded to the faculty as he passed them which they returned. The members then went forward and started retrieving the SeeD’s gear to return it to their dorms.

\----------------

She sat with the quiet monkish bowman next to her across from Tilmett and Leonhart. Tilmett had changed very little, maybe a little stronger about the limbs, but she’d studiously retained her childish affectation. Fujin had little doubt it was purposeful.

However, that occupied very little of her attention because she kept catching Leonhart’s eyes; he'd just stare at her, looking her over like she was a puzzle box.

Well, she could stare back. After the first few times where he was not dissuaded she found her eye wandering just like his had.

His sense of style had changed little, dark colors, heavy utility belt, he’d swapped the bomber jacket. She found herself lightly disappointed, it had been a hint of personality in the otherwise model student. But looking closer she found more hints, the way all his utility items favored a left hand draw, the sharp edge cut of his clothes showing they were new, or more likely, frequently replaced.

His hair had changed, he’d gone away from the tangled mop he’d passed as hair while a student and gone for a cut that left longer hair on top, he still had bangs, a note that privately amused her. She’d always thought he just liked having hair in his face, that it still hadn’t changed confirmed this for her.

She reviewed their brief duel in her mind, she’d been utterly unprepared, unlike their last two fights that had been on relatively even footing. She could tell he had been keeping up his skills certainly. He seemed to work quite well with his team, Tilmett and he had some kind of rapport from the shortest war in the history of the planet as far as she was aware. She internally cringed at his delivery to the monkish archer, but the guy seemed to appreciate the gesture, so who was she to judge. Watching him interact with his squad mates really drove home the difference in him over the last few years. He’d gone from a complete loner to something like a respected commander. I suppose he’d have to have to keep the title, but it was still interesting. She considered saying something about it, but guessed it wouldn’t be appreciated so settled instead on keeping her own counsel.

\----------------

Squall walked with Fujin as they headed to the second floor of the Garden past the classrooms into the administrative wing. The bustle of the place was continuing even despite the early hours. Administration was typically an early rising group, especially with the special circumstances they found themselves in. Fujin and Squall walked into a small room with a long window. It had a table with a few folders placed neatly on them, sitting in the room was Quistis, as expected. Squall walked in and motioned to one side of the table as he walked over and sat down at the other beside a tech panel.

“Are we ready to begin Instructor Trepe?” he asked as he tapped a few icons on the panel bringing it to life.

“Yes commander. Cadet Laskota?” Quistis looked over at Fujin with strict neutrality. Fujin nodded her greeting.

“Beginning Debrief of Fujin Laskota, Cadet Number 44527-193, Subject was A.W.O.L. since outset of Sorceress Ultimecia coup of Galbadia…” he added a bit of information to the record as it dutifully kept the notes. Once he’d made the opening notes he turned to Fujin who looked from him to Quistis. Squall took a moment and leaned on the table, bowing his head a moment.

“Alright, I’m tired, but we need to do this as soon as possible, so that means now.” he paused the recording with a few taps and then pulled up the intercom. “Cafeteria? Yes, this is Commander Leonheart.”

“Good morning commander, what can I do for you…?” they voice on the other end asked gently. Squall looked to Quistis who raised a hand and shook her head.

“Two breakfasts and two coffees...one twelve with eight grams sugar, two hundred milliliters cream…” he said and looked to Fujin who considered a moment.

“SAME.” she said. “Two then.” Squall confirmed.

“Of course commander, debrief room two?” the voice asked.

“Yes.” Squall confirmed and ended the intercom connection, switching back to the recording.

“Alright, let’s start from the top. Please explain for the record everything that happened after you were dispatched to collect cadet Almasy from Galbadia Garden.” he instructed and Fujin sighed, slumping in her seat a little before taking a deep breath and beginning.

The story was an epic tale, the other side of the conflict from near the start to the fairly bitter end. five hours later, three pauses for clarification, twenty pages of notes, two empty meal trays, one bathroom break, and the sun’s scorching rays burning through the window.

“So, more or less what we’d imagined…” Quistis commented looking back over their notes. Fujin was gargling water, her throat was sore, it was the most talking she’d done in literal years.

“The West Galbadian bloc is going to want her head, that’s a lot of state secrets. Then again, they’ve made a point of trying to hang SeeD before. Not that it worked out for them.” Squall said venomously.

“PATHETIC.” Fujin quipped hoarsely, coughed and stuck out her tongue making a gagging noise.

Quistis laughed behind a hand. “Well commander, I’ll be ready with my report probably tomorrow. I imagine half the administration is going to want to read all this.” she said tapping the corner of the terminal.

“They will. But a lot of this is actionable…” Squall says slowly reading over a few emphasised points.

“Especially against the Geezard who have been a thorn in our side as much as the east bloc…” looking over and meeting Fujin’s eye. She paused rubbing her throat.

“INFIL?” she asked and Squall looked at Quistis who looked uneasy.

“That’s very dangerous. We couldn’t commit a whole team to that… but that wasn’t what you had in mind.” she said her voice falling flat.

“No, I wasn’t.” He responded tapping a finger.

“Who? Kinneas? ” She responded quickly. “Xu? This is a risky mission at best.”

“Two of us, Her.” he said nodding his head toward Fujin, then met Quistis’ eye. “And me.”

“You’re SeeD commander most of the major players on the planet have seen your face. How are you going to deal with that?” Quistis pronounced testily.

“Haircut, dye, dresscode.” Fujin says counting on her fingers. Squall couldn’t help but slide into a smug smirk neatly mirrored on Fujin’s face.

“You…” Quistis started. “Ugh, We’re going to need to bring this to the counsel.” she conceded putting a hand to her face.

“Happily.” Squall enunciated sharply.

“She’s still under lockdown until after the meeting.” Quistis says softly looking over to ward Fujin who was sitting quietly at attention suddenly.

“Her old quarters were cleared out and belongings removed. I’ll ask around if any of them were not disposed of, but it has been years at this point.” she says standing up and primly adjusting her files.

Squall looked over at Fujin and then at the departing Quistis. “I’ll take you to holding for the night.” Squall said, standing but Fujin stayed seated, quietly sucking at her teeth while looking at him.

“IS…” she started and Squall paused. “THANKS.” she says after considering.

“...I know that I’m a different person than I was a year ago, let along what feels like three years and four lifetimes ago.” he said stone faced and she gave him a brief nod then stood up and straightened out her rumpled, blood stained and worn clothes.

He brought her in silence down to a place she knew well having brought her share of rule breakers there over the years. It was a space attached to the Dorm building. A security checkpoint, lost and found, and holding cells. It was staffed by NORG’s Garden Faculty though the uniform had been made slightly less anonymous it was still had a fairly derogatory nickname of the NFS, or No-Face-Space. There was a fair amount of disruption as Fujin and Squall moved through, both of them having something of a reputation at this point.

“Cadet Laskota will be held here tonight pending a meeting with the counsel.” he instructed to Intake who nodded as Fujin stepped forward to submit fingerprints and empty what little was in her pockets.

“...comply with any reasonable requests, including wardrobe, I’ll cover them for now.” he said, reaching into his jacket to display a Garden ID badge which was dutifully logged before he turned and walked away.

“I’ll be by to collect you when we get assembled… probably tomorrow.” he said stepping out of the NFS.

\----------------

Fujin considered her current lot in life inside the small windowless cubby room. It was nicer than the more temporary cells. Often reserved for visiting family, it had a double bed, a side table, an attached bathroom, and a writing desk.

The first thing she had done was peel off her fairly wretched clothes and went into the shower, she had exhausted the small container of hair and body wash, scrubbing ingrained dirt and blood from her body. It had taken nearly two hours because she would pause and lean against the tiles of the little stall and feel herself slip away with the water running down her body.

What felt like the distant past surrounded her. Garden, and if she let her eye unfocus she would recognize the tone of the place, the spirit. It made her feel like a child she no longer really was. Then the far more recent past would surge up. Years moving from place to place, plying the skills she had been taught, murder for hire, bodyguard, infiltration, intimidation, robbery, the weight of living score to score, washing with a basin of if-she-were-fortunate lukewarm water, or a tiny moldy cubicle shower in some hostel.

As she cleaned her body the stench of her life enveloped her and she could just stand staring at the stark clean white of the tile barely able to breath, it felt like the air was thick, she could taste the smoke, the sweat, the desperation, then it was gone only to come again in waves. Twice someone came into her room and knocked on the shower door nearly making her jump out of her skin and crack her head on the tile. Just to check on her. When was the last time someone had cared if she was alive or dead? The last time she was at FH probably…

Just as she was coming to terms with that past; the future weighed back in. Going back to that life, for who knows how long. Serving another master and caking blood and sweat and mud back on her body. She sank to her knees on the apathetic tile floor, her lungs refusing to fill with air. The sheer weight of it laying on her like a colossus.

But it wouldn’t be the same, she sucked in a deep breath. Not really. She’d have a partner in this, this granted a second hot, humid breath. Someone she knew, despite their history, she could trust. The weight lessened enough for her to climb back to her feet and stagger out of the shower, barely having the presence of mind to turn it off. She stood nude in front of the mirror, both hands braced on the sink beneath it, dripping wet to stare herself in the eye. She really looked at herself then, running her hands over her face and her body, remembering the scars and where she’d earned them, marveling at how much younger she looked clean. Or perhaps it was just the sharp, clean white light that was so like daylight. She wished she could cut her hair and add a little makeup to finalize her transformation. .

Walking out in the fairly thin but absorbent towel she had found waiting for her, into the cell to find her clothes had been folded and laid on the bed, beside them was a set of generic school fatigues in balamb blue. She walked over to her clothes, the last of her possessions she owned and even as she touched their stiff, dirty fabric she found herself softly recoiling. She really wanted to put them back on, but couldn’t make herself. She stood over the fatigues and finally ended up laying on the bed wrapped in the towel, unable to make herself dress. On the wall of the cell was an intercomm. For some time she stared at it, thinking about all the things she wanted to say, the requests she could make, the demands, none of it was worth the hassle of talking. Of even trying to communicate.

She woke up to a firm knock on the door, starting her badly. So badly she tumbled out of the bed where she had sprawled, asleep.

“Cadet Laskota.” Squall’s voice penetrated the door fairly well. She scrambled, leaping up and after a recoiling moment of anger and frustration banished by a growl she snatched up the fatigues and hurriedly tried to pull them on as Squall knocked a second time around the time she let out an indignant squawk trying to pull her pants on too quickly and tumbling to the floor with a bang.

“Fujin? Are you alright?” a note of confusion and concern entering his voice.

“YES. NAKED.” she answered sharply and immediately regretted her admittance as she shoved her feet into her boots, unable to locate where the socks had gotten scattered to, and practically running to the door to open it. On the other side was Squall Leonhart, looking primed and ready, wearing a slight variation on the clothes she had seen him wearing in the field, choosing a more formal jacket and slacks. It was about this time in her rush she looked to the side and spotted the underwear she realized she wasn’t wearing. She swallowed her mortification with aplomb and met his eye unflinchingly. Afterall, he had no way of knowing or telling.

“...” they stared at each other a long moment before Squall reached wordlessly into his pocket and pulled out a small comb that he offered to her. She could feel her face flush pink as she accepted the comb and ran it through her hair with a minimum of hissing and a few snarls to match the ones in her fairly short hair. It took only about half a minute to fight her hair into a semblance of order and hand back the comb. He took it and put it back in his pocket without comment.

“We’re expected, let’s go.” He said turning on his heel and leading her. It was easy to fall in and be led. It gave her time to master her pounding heart from the empty nightmares born of anxiety and even the slightest physical relaxation. Her mind seemed to have taken it as liberty to boil over with everything she’d had to panic about over the last three years.

“You are all right?” he asked as they boarded the elevator, she sighed.

“YES. ASLEEP.” she answered and he nodded slightly. She was relieved that he didn’t press. Then again, she was surprised he’d asked. No, not really, the old Squall that fought with Seifer like they were still children wouldn’t have asked, but even during the war she had seen him change dramatically over the three times they’d bumped into each other. In Galbadia Garden, Balamb, and finally on the Lunatic…

They walked in silence to the second floor administrative section all over again, though the room they headed to was one of the client briefing rooms rather than a debriefing room. She was greeted by largely familiar faces. Tilmett, Trepe, Xu…

Fujin frowned, realizing that she wasn’t actually sure if that was the woman’s given name or surname before deciding that it didn’t really matter and coming in to sit down. The leaders of Garden and not a single person over the age of 30. She kept the thought to herself.

“Something bothering you cadet?” Xu asked sharply, to which Fujin gave a quick shake of the head.

“NO, MA’AM.” Xu accepted this with a suspicious glare as the evening sun streamed into the room

“Good, then we can begin. I suppose we have you to thank for the shakeup in the mission for East Galbadia that is going to put us in the red for this month.” Xu stated snidely, Selphie rolled her eyes.

“Less than 10% deficit isn’t going to kill us.” the short brunette declared with a smile, tapping away at a panel that caused the table’s display to light up and show a slew of budgetary charts with far more lines and numbers than Fujin could take in at a glance like the others seated here seemingly could. LIkely through familiarity.

“Not the point.” Xu said with a dismissive wave of the hand.

“I know, but let’s get our facts straight!” Selphie quipped cheerily. Quistis quickly interjected just as Xu was turning to more fully face the smaller woman.

“To the matter at hand. I’m sure we’ve all read the report more than once at this point…” she said scanning the others at the table, Xu and Selphie nodding while Squall remained stoically still.

“Yes, we have a delinquent student with more field experience than many of our acting SeeD and enough ground level insider information to start an insurgency. Which is what our Commander proposes. I’m opposed, too much rests on small scale information and inference. We need to verify and dig out some of this before we dare attempt something this audacious. Especially if we’re going to be risking one of our top agents on it.” Xu spoke in her usual clipped tones, spelling it out with sharp enunciation. Selphie’s cheeks puffed up and her mouth formed a tight line for several seconds before she made a less-than-dignified sound of letting the pressure through her lips to speak.

“As much as I know personally Fujin… Cadet Laskota’s skills are what they are, I still gotta agree, this is throwing a lot of eggs into a basket, and Fujin herself admitted that she only had fleeting contact with some of these figures. I think, if we want to do this, we should treat it as, like, four ops not one. Send out some feelers, develop some of these contacts, you know?” Selphie asks looking around the room at the other faces to gauge support.

“Information like this is fleeting, as we’ve learned the hard way, every hour we wait is another potential shakeup in these hierarchies. If we want to act, we need to move quickly before the opportunity is lost to us. Adding new faces and trying to create a network could just as easily tip our hand and close off the path to a decisive victory all together.” Squall argued, his voice quiet and even. Xu was already shaking her head, but Selphie looked conflicted. The three heads turned toward Quistis who was worrying her lower lip with her teeth while sliding through reports and the debrief and looking at the numbers.

“We don’t have the resources to fully commit to developing this lead if we want to stay afloat, There are not enough SeeD to go around as is. Furthermore, Garden policy is to send SeeD out on field missions and Miss Laskota, regardless of her record, is not a SeeD. She never graduated and she’s quickly approaching the wash out point, you’re nineteen now correct? So I propose a compromise. We recon in, verify what we can over the next two weeks as we come up to the next field exam for graduation, Cadet Laskota will have her chance to graduate there, and if she does…” Quistis let out a small huff of laughter shared by Squall and Selphie who knew what the woman was capable of. “We proceed with this opportunity with our eyes open and better prepared.” Quistis stated decisively, meeting the eyes of her fellows, and Fujin as well.

Xu was chewing it over, her jaw working silently as she looked at what Quistis was proposing on the schedule. Selphie was back in the budgetary reports looking at the numbers and mumbling about salaries. Squall was sitting with a slight frown his gaze distant as he considered. Fujin’s eye danced around the group waiting for any further arguments.

“Should work out!” Selphie chimed in, her hair bouncing as she suddenly went from bent over the displays to sitting ramrod straight. Xu shook her head, “I’m still unconvinced this is a good course of action.”

Squall’s eyes refocused, “I concede to Quistis’ points. A two week delay shouldn’t allow the window to close on us.” his declaration brought the three of them all looking back to Xu who had a deep frown.

“My objections stand. But I’ll find the SeeD for the job. And I hope I’m wrong.” Xu stated turning toward Fujin.

“I believe that means you’re reinstated, cadet. Congratulations.” She said before standing up with her back straight and walking out of the room.

“I believe that concludes this meeting!” Selphie stated after Xu walked out, turning to Quistis and Squall with a large, toothy smile. “How about dinner?” she asked bringing a light laugh from Quistis and a shake of the head from Squall. “Sure. Kinneas is already down at the cafeteria waiting for us I imagine?” Selphie took a finger to her display pad and quickly removed a chat window.

“Noooooooooo….” she trailed off with a slightly wider smile. Quistis’ laugh was musical.

“Alright, let’s go. Fujin you’re welcome to join us if you like. I understand the Faculty is clearing out a dorm room for you as we speak. I hope you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of requisitioning some clothes and basic necessities that should arrive ahead of you.” the blonde woman added with a much more subdued smile.

Fujin considered the three of them, one by one, first Selphie, who’s exuberance radiated off her in waves, then Quistis who’s air of quiet poise was much less glaring to the stone face of Squall who hadn’t agreed or disagreed but it seemed like his assent was taken for given as he stood up and looked back at her.

She considered, of the group, the one she was most concerned about taking offense to her being around was the only one she hadn’t seen. “DINCHT?” she asked her eye sliding past as Selphie’s smile faltered, Quistis’ mouth twisted to a frown, and though Squall’s expression didn’t shift his demeanordemeanor took on a darker cast.

“He’s not at Garden anymore.” Squall said as Selphie and Quistis shared a look, presumably trying to decide who was going to say something only to be preempted by the commander who turned toward the door.

“I’m famished, I don’t know about you all.” he said without looking back. The dismissive air to the statement catalyzed the three women who let the uncomfortable subject pass them over. Quistis and Selphie were nearly shoulder to shoulder as they exited the room.

“So you’re back on with Kinneas again?” Quistis asked softly and Selphie sighed dramatically.

“We were never off! There was just a-an argu- a disagreement!” she chirped. Quistis leaned slightly away from the woman raising one perfectly sculpted eyebrow.

“You gave him a black eye.” she said and Selphie let out an irritated growl that morphed into a forced laugh. “Well he was on My bed at the time!” she said with a more vicious smile than any of the previous.

“With Cadet Temfa, if I do recall. That was what, the fourth time, sixth?” Quistis needled good naturedly as Selphie stuck out her tongue at the taller woman. Fujin’s face twisted into amazement following behind this conversation.

“Look, if we’re being completely fair he walked in on me when I was trying Zachariah on for… like, Size. so I guess turnabout is fair play. After the first time I just figured we were, like, at least kind of open?” Selphie said shrugging her shoulders defensively and gesticulating.

“Well, I seem to recall you getting pretty jealous, and he got pretty jealous back…” Quistis started, and Selphie practically jumped down her throat.

“I did not get jealous! I thought we were exclusive! That’s all it was!” Selphie exclaimed, throwing up her arms and her head back.

“Hm.” Quistis added, holding her elbows.

“Good, we agree!” Selphie said adding a skip into her step and clasping her hands behind her back humming a jaunty tune. They made it to the cafeteria without further incident. They gathered food. Fujin had vivid memories of standing in line for quite a while to get food on a busy day like today. Discovering that SeeD had a priority queue, annoying, but she’ll take the favoritism because Squall was willing to order her food through it. She joined them at their table that had a view of the setting sun, sure enough Selphie was quickly in the lap of the long hair’d mustachio’d guy with the cowboy hat and duster. Fujin remembered him being a hell of a shot but being otherwise unimpressed with his showy attitude.

Her giggling and his wandering hands were something she preferred to ignore however focusing more of her interest on looking around the cafeteria. There were not as many familiar faces as she would have thought. Her attention was diverted as Selphie jumped up from the gunman’s lap and slapped him across the face in a quick motion without any real force behind it but the sound echoed and interrupted a few conversations.

“A sundress isn’t an invitation you awful, awful man!” she chastised Irvine, wagging finger and all.

“Would you forgive me if I got you an icecream?” he asked with an honestly very well practiced charming smile. She put her hands on her hips, leaned in toward him. Staring him in the face with narrowed eyes.

“...Yes.” she said, and turned her back on him crossing her arms dramatically as the man stood up smoothly offered a shrug, a tip of the hat to her that made her bring her glass to her mouth to avoid saying anything inflammatory.

“I can’t believe you let him get away with that so much, he keeps doing that because you let him get off so easily.” Quistis chastised.

Selphie pouted and stomped a foot before dropping down into the seat the gunman had vacated.

“If he didn’t get me off so easily I’d be more mad.” She grumbled and Squall had the foresight to duck to the side as Fujin utterly failed to swallow properly while trying to laugh in shock.

“OH NO! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Selphie said jumping up and scurrying to hover around Fujin who held her at bay with a strong arm coughing as tonic and orange juice slowly got coughed up and cleared from her nose and sinuses.

Quistis shook her head looking at Fujin worriedly. Squall was halfway out of his seat before he seated himself again as the silver haired woman regained the ability to breath fairly quickly.

“Damn that boy, if his dick game wasn’t earthshattering I’d sock him good for you!” Selphie said, gathering her fists under her chin.

“That wasn’t even Irvine’s fault.” Squall commented quietly, completely ignored by Selphie as that comment caused a completely undignified snort from Fujin that ended in another coughing spree and more fretting and flitting from Selphie who in the span of seconds offered to get the doctor, cast a high powered restorative spell, summon a Guardian Force to restore her, and punch Irvine in the asshole. The last of which got a dry chuckle from Squall and a tired sigh from Quistis.

The rest of the meal went relatively well Irvine returned with an enticing looking dish of ice cream. And easily fell back into the inane chatter that Tilmett and Kinneas produced. Fujin felt very strange being so easily included by Selphie in her ongoing dialogue but managed to remain aloof much as Squall did by sheer stoicism. Selphie responded to this by completely failing to notice. She did receive an utterly insincere, flirting apology from Kinneas at Tilmett’s request, which she rebuffed with a glare so cold he didn’t try it again.

After the meal Quistis and Selphie (along with Irvine) split off citing obligations, Quistis primly and Selphie suggestively. Squall nodded to them as the left leaving the table with just Fujin and Squall.

“Why did you switch to using a sword?” he asked suddenly. Turning his head in her direction as hers snapped to him.

“VERSATILE.” she answered quickly.

“Hm. You have some skill. Did you ever try many weapons?” he asked smoothly.

“NO.” she answered after considering.

“Hm. you still have my requisition authority for your basics. I’d talk to the quartermaster today.” he said setting aside the glass he’d been nursing as he considered. She watched him go without further comment.  
After she left the cafeteria alone she found her feet carrying her to the Quartermaster nominally attached to the garages, it was a lockup for all the equipment that could or might be issued to SeeD or cadets that was for one reason or another controlled. Her little outfitting mission resulted in ten outfits, mostly combat ready fatigues, one Cadet uniform, utility belts, tactical webbing, and a small assortment of new weapons, throwing chakram, a hand and a half sword in the galbadian style, as well as a combat knife for backup and more utilitarian uses. Putting on clothes that fit her, that were clean and of high quality felt like a sea change.

She found herself in a dorm with three others, she didn’t know them but it didn’t matter, she didn’t intend to be here much. She had promises to keep, and scores to settle.


	4. Firm Instruction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wherein Fujin and Squall share some quality time, then Fujin has a very rough evening in a holding cell after a fairly threatening situation naked and alone in the showers. Violence ensues.

She sat on the edge of her bed, tightening her cadet-issue, weather-resistant, combat boots. Tucked into those boots were her lightly armored fatigue pants. A sleeveless white undershirt and her similarly armored light fatigue jacket. Her battered eye patch put in place. She grabbed the sheath for her sword and the hip pouch with her short supply of throwing chakram. She checked her junction, Pandemona coiled and roiled within, her supply of magic crackled in her core. She was ready for her first day of classes. 

This… was going to be exceptionally strange. The door to her room stood open and the common room was already animated. She could hear two of her roommates talking in mercifully hushed voices while the last occupied the bathroom. Fujin woke with the sun and had swept in first, making it back to her room before the others had even left their rooms. Now she sat staring at her boots and the neigh-empty room around her with the same sort of empty feeling she’d had since the previous night.

After visiting the Quartermaster, she’d found her room and found the tiny pile of her belongings taken from her in Galbadia on the bed. Literally a few pocketfuls of things, her smokes, some gil notes folded in a little bag with four fake IDs. That had been virtually all of value. She ended up with one of the smokes in her lips before realizing her lighter was absent. She let out a single dry bark of laughter that interrupted the conversation in the other room and brought a head into the frame of the door a few moments later.

“Hi.” the dark skinned face took her in from sword to outfit. 

Fujin turned her head and locked eyes with the woman, who after a few heartbeats continued.

“I guess we’re roommates now? Did you transfer in, we’re seniors here...” she asked politely enough, one hand curling onto the door frame as she slowly stepped into the door. Wearing pants cut off to mid thigh and a half-sleeve top. Her hair cut shoulder length and tied at the base of her skull. Fujin judged she had reasonable muscle tone, but that meant little even in cadets if they had a junction active. 

“SENIOR.” she answered with the unlit stick in her lips, earning a little jump from the girl whose smile was only slightly bewildered.

“Okay, not much for small talk, huh? Haha… So um, I’m Karen…” The woman said awkwardly, reaching up to pull at her hair. 

“...” Fujin stared at the audacity of this woman to not take a hint, sighed, letting her head roll forward so her chin touches her collarbone and lets it loll for a few seconds. 

“FUJIN.” she pronounced, turning her head to stare the woman down. The intruder drew herself up and her smile widened to become more honest. 

“Nice ta meetcha!” she said popping up on her toes for a moment in a strangely tilmettian fashion.

From just outside her room she heard a soft voice speaking in a sharper, lower voice.

“Isn’t that the name of the cadet who sided with Galbadia…?” the voice asked, drawing a small cringe from Karen who glanced to the side.

“YES.” Fujin answered, her voice harsh.

Karen recoiled slightly letting a short haired woman with a harsh face popped around the corner. 

“Then why’d they let you back?” she asked, her brown eyes narrowed, matching her skin that was almost as dark as Raijin’s.

“CONTROLLED.” Fujin answered, Karen relaxed slightly as the heavy stare shifted to this new face who glared right back.

“Pft.” the darker woman huffed. Fujin let out a breath and stood up, gathering her gear.

“CLASS.” she pronounced walking straight at the two girls who had to be brushed aside to let Fujin pass.

“Really?” The darker, shorter woman asked, checking the watch on her wrist.

“Not for like, an hour!” she griped, grabbing her bag and taking off after her, Karen darted to grab her things as well.

“Veera!” she shouted following the two women with a delicate frown on her face to match the mild distaste on Fujin’s resting face and the active scowl on Veera’s. The three of them walked, with Fujin at the front, smoke still in her lips as they walked out of the cadet section, through to the SeeD dorms and then Fujin paused to consider before knocking on one of the doors. Her roommates nervously hovering behind her, watching out of sheer curiosity as nearly thirty seconds later Squall Leonhart opened the door and then paused one hand on the door, dressed in his dress pants, boots and undershirt. 

“LIGHT.” she pronounced the tip of the smoke wiggling. Squall stared at her levelly and then reached behind the door and produced a lighter which he handed to her and closed the door softly. She took the lighter, tossed it in the air once and tucked it in her pocket before turning and heading back the way they’d come. 

“Wait, did you just bother the Commander of SeeD for a lighter?! I have a lighter!” Veera said, patting down her pockets furiously and digging a hand into her bag to produce it, stepping up beside Fujin to shove it out in front of her.

“DIDN’T OFFER.” she said as they reached the glass transition to the main body of Garden where Fujin paused, stepping out into the courtyard and lighting the smoke before pocketing the lighter. 

“...so wait, why did you do that? How did you know which room was his?” Karen asked as Veera muttered, stuffing her lighter away in her bag as Fujin puffed at the sedative, passively watching the sky. 

“DISCIPLINARY.” was the answer that only increased Karen’s visible confusion.

“You remember his room number from literally before the war!?” Karen exclaimed looking shocked.

“YES.” Fujin answered, then her eye slid over to the shocked cadet and a tiny smirk querked in the corner of her mouth for only a moment. 

“Is he going to be mad at us?” Karen wondered out loud. 

“I’ve never seen him actually get angry at anybody specifically before.” Veera answered fishing around for a pack of Cool Blue brand smokes and lighting one for herself, Fujin huffed derisively, smoke huffing out of her nose as she did. Veera gave her a dirty look, and then looked her over boots to hair.

Karen snapped back to Fujin, “Wait you only answered half that question! Why did you bother him for a lighter, he doesn’t smoke, how did you know he had a lighter in the first place?” she asked glaring owlishly at Fujin whose eye slid off the bright clouds above and onto the woman while the corner of her mouth rose into a smug smirk then slowly faded away as she looked back up at the sky and blew out a long plume of smoke firmly ignoring the interrogation.

Being a cadet wasn’t so bad. The weight of the world was a little lighter when inconsequential things like knowing that the commander of Garden had a lighter in his pocket was the height of scandal. 

\---------------------

“Well, low key was never really your style.” Quistis commented on the silver haired woman sulkily drinking her juice through a straw. 

“Three reprimands in one class is some kind of record I think. In the first week even!” Selphie commented with a giggle. Fujin hit the end of her juice and inhaled harder making a long gurgling noise.

“It’ll be fine. Six hours of detention will go by like wind, I believe you’re cleaning the gym equipment, and the showers.” Quistis said, gently popping the olive from her sandwich into her mouth. She’d been ignoring it to tease Fujin. Her eyes sparkling with a grim sort of cheer. Selphie meanwhile seemed more genuinely conciliatory, flinching at Quistis’ comment.

“Ew, I’m sorry Fujin… that’s rough… but well, you did break Fallha’s arm, set him on fire, and hurl him through a window…” she said counting off on her fingers with a small wince.

“WAS THERE.” she said sharply, glaring at the much shorter woman. Selphie smiled shyly, showing as many teeth as her cheeks would let her and letting out a little titter. 

“It’ll be an important lesson in restraint.” Quistis said, taking a bite of sandwich with delicate relish. 

“Hi, Squall!” Selphie declared shooting halfway out of her seat as the commander walked by with a can in one hand pausing over the girl’s table.

“Cadet. I know you’re more skilled than most of the others at this point.” he started than paused to sip his can as Fujin’s shoulders and hackles rose and she seemed like she would gladly shove her face in the cup if she could take the embarrassment of actually doing that.

“But exhibitions are not the proper place to settle personal arguments.” Squall’s eyes looked down at the side of her head while she resolutely stared at the floor, her jaw working on nothing.

“Good showing, otherwise. Impressive paramagical manipulation.” He said as he walked away, Selphie perked up.

“OH RIGHT!” she shouted, returning to a more normal volume and a less cagey smile.

“Have you heard about the new research coming out of Esthar!? Admixture! Somebody got Admixture to work!” she said, clapping her hands. This immediately got Fujin’s attention.

“ADMIXTURE.” she said deadpanned. Selphie nodded her head so fast her bob was sent wildly bouncing.

“Yep! I’ll forward you the documentation as soon as I get to a terminal!” she said, reaching out to slap Fujin on the shoulder in a familiar way. The younger woman opted to allow it.

“Excuse me, but I’m not up on my magical theory… What is admixture?” Quistis asked, one sculpted eyebrow raised in interest at something so clearly exciting both of the women in front of her.

“HETERO-DOUBLING PARAMAGICAL EXPRESSION.” Fujin explained as she aggressively swirled her cup, to the sound of ice dryly shuffling about, much to her consternation.

“Um…” Quistis commented considering how she wanted to elaborate before being interrupted by Selphie.

“It’s something that’s been theorized for-EVER! Double magic, you know about it right? Allows a user to control two independent strands of magic allowing for some pretty complicated shaping or just straight up doubling the power for effort. Well, paramagic usually doesn’t play nice with other paramagics, the resonances will reject each other!” Selphie started explaining even after Quistis held up both her hands trying to slow Selphie down, unsuccessful, prompting drastic measures from the blonde.

“So like…!” Quistis shoved a hand over Selphie’s mouth.

“Slow down, my expertise is culture, not paramagical studies Selphie. Use small words please.” offering the brunette a pleading smile.

“Okay, so like. Have you ever used Double or Triple?” Selphie asked, already bouncing as Quistis’ hand started tracking her mouth again.

“Once I think during the war.” she replied smoothly, visibly waiting for Selphie to launch hard.

“Normally Double and Triple merely allow multiple strands of the same spell to be cast in parallel, Admixture was a theoriezed event where double or triple could be used to force two different spell strands together to get unique or additively compounded effects.” Selphie and Quistis both paused looking over at Fujin, who punctuated her explanation by putting the straw back in her mouth and sucking at the watered down juice that had managed to melt out of the ice.

“Uh, That.” Selphie said pointing at Fujin, Quistis smiled at the third wheel to their little dramatic moment.

“Thank you Ms. Laskota, for the succinct explanation.” 

“WELCOME.” 

“So yeah, they totally actually got it to happen in controlled circumstances, AND! AND! Released the methodology!” Selphie said, waving her hands toward Fujin who passively observed the brunette ball of energy.

“READ.” she said aggressively, shaking the cup full of ice again.

“Ms. Laskota you could go refill the cup, you know.” Quistis said pursing her lips and furrling her brows.

In response Fujin turned her head toward the nearest trash can she could see and judged the cup a moment rolling it in her hand then hurled it overhand into the bin.

“Point!” Selphie chirped as Quistis sighed.

“Your detention starts after your last class today.” Quistis reminded softly of which Fujin dramatically slouched.

“YES.” she added standing up taking her bag with her to head to her next engagement.

\-----------------------------

A few uneventful days later.

“Will Cadet Laskota please report to the second floor administrative offices at the end of the section, please.” A voice came over the loudspeakers in the deafening silence that followed fifteen pairs of eyes turned back to look at the silver haired woman who was staring resolutely at her terminal without a word. 

“Cadet?” The instructor pronounced sternly.

“HEARD.” she announced. The instructor took this as acknowledgement enough and continued in his lesson on the native fauna of the Galbadian west, something Fujin herself was already intimately familiar with.

After an interminable lecture she gathered her belongings and made her way up to the second floor and upon arriving in the administrative section a small desk in the hallway motioned her over and directed her to an office, she followed the instructions with deepening curiosity as to what this was all about before she opened the door to find Squall sitting at a small table that was absolutely covered in paper and a large terminal. He sat with both hands resting on the table staring intently at the screen as though his sheer annoyance with it might destroy it and relieve him of his duty. He looked up at her as the door opened and he stood.

“Fujin.” brushing his uniform flat as he stood.

“REPORTING.” She started with a snap salute.

“At ease, right on time.” he said, pushing in his chair.

“We have some work to do, if we’re going to work together.” he said, picking up a small duffel bag off the ground along with his weapon case.

“TRAINING?” she asked, eyeing the bag.

“Yeah. I don’t know how your… group worked, but I like to have a firm idea of what the people I’m working with are capable of if possible. Join me?” he asked, walking past her to the door and opening it. She followed with a nod.

They left Garden proper, moving out into the cool salt breeze carried from the ocean mere kilometers away. In the grasslands they both went over their equipment checks, Squall rotated the cylinder of his shear trigger, checking each chamber and ensuring all the mechanisms were properly oiled, his eyes distant and cold. 

No doubt ruffling about within himself. Rumor had it that the commander had no less than three guardian forces. It was unusual and they were rare enough that having more than one was noteworthy, not to mention the personalities of the spiritual beings were known to conflict quite easily. His multitasking abilities were not tested by the threefold split in his attention. Settling his magic, inspecting his weapon, these were almost reflexive actions. He’d learned to practically be capable of doing it in combat. 

No, most of his attention was on his opponent. She stood turning her sword over in a complicated flourish, painfully slowly. One hand sliding down to grasp the little pouches on her belt he knew contained the chakram that had made her so painful to fight in previous encounters, though in miniature. He considered her style as it had been, then compared it to that night in Sawton. It was night and day, but then again, she had changed from one of three to a solo combatant. He knew his fighting style had evolved through the years as well. It influenced his Junctioning fairly heavily, a primary melee fighter with magical support as opposed to someone like Selphie who used her weapon as a backup to her paramagical abilities. 

He gave the shear trigger a few test swings. It was strange to use a more basic model gunblade. He’d purchased this one new the previous week when he realized that Lionheart was fairly distinctive and would give him away easily. Well, Quistis had informed him, and had eventually won the debate. He was having to relearn how to use a steel weapon, the Lionheart was far lighter than this model, an advantage to those with phenomenal physical strength, where hitting was more important than the impact of the actual strike. It also channeled the trigger in unique and powerful ways that this model simply couldn’t manage. Trade offs in all things. She stopped what she was doing and looked up at him. He met her gaze evenly, his head rising slightly, her face hardened and she gave a brief sharp nod. 

They had talked about the rules of this little training session on the way out to the fields. They’d settled on a few ground rules, Squall had shared some of his stock of high density magic to boost Fujin’s toughness so they could afford to go all out. No trick too dirty, but try not to maim the other. Paramagic can fix a lot but not total amputation.

Fujin took these moments to plan. She’d fought Squall three times before, his style had always been to skirmish until he could land a decisive blow, relying on the weight and massive damage the gunblade was known for. Contrast Seifer’s style which was heavier on commitment to a single engagement. Fury versus a sort of icey patience. She could respect it but it was exploitable as a strategy. She grasped the handle of her blade and made small adjustments to her grip. She was happy with the small modifications she’d already made and was wearing in the material fairly well. She took a deep breath and looked up at Squall whose eyes were on her already. His pose was relaxed, like a dragon. Ready to swoop against her and devour her first mistake. Not making a mistake was impossible, but feinting one was a powerful strategy if she could capitalize. 

She started boosting her speed as high as she could. Hoping to push Squall to the back foot early and gather some momentum. Her blade flashed out and his gunblade was already in the way, fighting him one on one was already different. She kept up the pressure, though it was difficult to tell when her moment would come, he was being extremely passive, evading or parrying without striking out much. 

Before long she shifted her tactics, using a strike and slip strategy instead, striking out to slip back and throw Aero spells to try to foul his poise. The magic slipped over him carrying him a few steps but his center of gravity was unerring and she couldn’t attack and cast at the same time, shaping took too much attention. 

She was shocked when he finally attacked. She had just thrown a fire spell only to have him literally leap through it, blade tip first. It took every ounce of speed she had to not take that sword somewhere she didn’t want it to ever be. Her parry did more to throw her off balance than him. They were nearly the same size now. He however felt much more solid. For the next few steps of their dance she was fending wildly, unwilling to let his powerful strokes catch her flat on the blade as even a glancing blow rang up her arms. It was galling that even as powerful as she was he still had the advantage of raw strength. 

Their fight quickly became a brawl. She mixed kicks and took their fight from a purely weapon and paramagical duel to a battlefield. Dirt was blown up, grass sheared, fire sent spinning off into the wind. Lightning crackled leaving smoldering patches. She took a glancing blow and found her vision swimming and her veins on fire even as her eyes burned fiercely and clouded just slightly, her resistances blunting the magic before it could blind her entirely. She also was deeply thankful she had decided he was likely to try to silence her. Attacking her ability to channel paramagic would have been too good a strategy to not prepare for. 

Their fight became far more serious when she realized she had been poisoned, she started to fall back from his attacks more, relying more on magical superiority, as his spells had nowhere near the power of hers. It was in the midst of this she made her play. Deliberately holding her ground when he was just barely too close and gathered her magic for a moment. He dove in with a leap to capitalize even as she let the magic go and shifted her stance. He caught his mistake as he barreled down on her. Her galbadian style sword was slightly longer than his and only her turning her blade slightly too far let him hit the flat of the blade and slide down into her leaving both of them in a heap as he’d tried to twist in mid air unsuccessfully.

Laying in the dirt in a cloud of kicked dust and shorn grass. Squall stood up first, pushing himself off her where she lay a few moments more. She was smirking and was almost surprised to see he was too as he waved a hand and she felt the flush of healing magic push the heart-stopping burn of the poison.

“I got overeager.” He admitted after she took his offered hand and pulled her back to her feet with ease. 

“PAIN?” She asked, one brow rising up 

“Pain. A little something from off-world.” he said enigmatically as she checked the cuts and bruises their fight had netted while he did the same, answering as he pulled off his jacket, planted his gunblade and hung the jacket from its hilt. He opted for a curative ointment than magic like she was using.

“Oh. LITERALLY?” she asked, curious.

“Yes, there were some creatures aboard the Ragnarok when we… retrieved it. That needed to be dealt with, we drew the thread from them.” He explained as he gently worked the restorative into his skin with a practiced hand. 

She pulled up a Cure thread and carefully pushed it to her wounds, closing them easily with practiced speed. Then she found herself watching as he stretched, hissed, and sighed as the bruises faded, and cuts pulled together into faint scars that would likely fade with time. He turned his head.

“Something on your mind?” he asked neutrally and her eye sliding off to the side.

“LEARNING?” she asked, it was the purpose of the whole exercise.

“Yes. Your fighting style has grown a lot since you moved to a melee style. Your bladework still needs work, you rely too much on the junction. No complaint of para-prowess.” He said deadpan, she let out a small snort.

“PRACTICE?” she asked sardonically as Squall paused the healing application and looked back at her. 

“...Occasionally.” he admitted before moving to his legs, loosening his belt to get at his thighs.

“HELP?” she asked crossing her arms and cocking her hips. He shrugged. 

“I find the trouble of doing it this way is a good reminder to not get hit.” He muttered, getting a dry chuckle out of Fujin who lifted her sword back up and thought about what he’d said. Her fighting style with the sword was fairly ad hoc…

“TEACH?” she asked looking over at him.

“I’m… well, the sword and the gunblade have some pretty big differences. Here.” He put away the ointment, lifted his jacket and tossed it on the ground before pulling up the revolver and offering it to her hilt first. She took it and as he let go she marveled quietly at its weight taking her hands and gripping it as she’d seen him do. 

“DIFFERENT.” she adjusted her grip a few times and gave it a few test swings, just getting her hands to control it without risking pulling the trigger was rough, and she eventually took her finger off the trigger entirely. Squall watched her arms by his side, a distant look on his face.

“INSTRUCT?” she asked, looking up holding the blade firmly.

“We’re about to undertake a new mission, changing to a new…” he started as she looked meaningfully at the sword on the ground and nudged it with her boot.

“Well…” he said, patting down his hair while looking away to collect himself. When he looked back at her she had a bemused smirk resting on the corner of her mouth. He frowned and tugged his jacket on.

“Whatever… sure.” he said and walked over behind her. She seemed mildly startled as she felt him step up behind her and make small adjustments to her arms and hands, then shifted her footing with nudges of his boot, his chest pressed to her back. 

“It’s not a sword, there’s a sweet spot, too deep and you can stick the blade, too shallow and pulling the trigger might buck it out of your hand. Never dry fire, trust me.” he explained. His hands still on her hands and arms as he slowly guided her through some basic motions.

“A lot of this will evolve as you develop your own way, but there’s some fundamentals…” he spoke with a soft steady voice that made it easy for Fujin to focus. It was very different. She seldom had gentle instruction, or sought it out at all. The smile grew just slightly as they worked together, him taking up her sword to give her something to swing at without having to hunt down live monsters. 

\--------------------

Time slipped by, as afternoon faded toward evening and the shadows on the plains grew long. Severals hours of one on one practice left Fujin with a visible sheen of sweat from the work while Squall still had much of his poise remaining. Thanks to their Forces their arms didn’t do more than quiver with their hours long endurance run of training. Something both would be thankful for on reflection. 

Now the two of them gathered what they had come out with and walked back toward Garden in companionable silence. Neither felt the need to speak though they did walk nearly shoulder to shoulder. Good progress had been made, Fujin could admit to herself she felt like she had gained a lot more from spending a few hours with her hands around an unfamiliar weapon than she had in the last few days of cadet classes. As they approached the gates Squall spoke softly.

“If you’re interested we can do this again… tomorrow afternoon?” he said considering and his eyes tracked over to watch her out of his peripheral vision.

“YES.” she said without hesitation. Then paused a moment.

“TEACH YOU.” she said with a smirk.

“Teach me what, oh, shaping?” understanding dawning on his face.

“YES.” she said with a small smirk pulling up the corner of her mouth.

“...Fine. I acknowledge my lack of skill, but I doubt I’ll make it to your level with any kind of speed. Selphie’s tried to teach the rest of us before and…. That was… hm. She tried very hard.” he said hesitating to say anything incriminating. Fujin snorted quietly.

“BETTER.” she insisted and he shrugged a shoulder. As they walked in, Squall continued.

“Grab a bite to eat or go hit the showers first, do you think?” shifting his arms thoughtfully and imagining he could feel the grime of the plains on his skin.

“SHOWER.” She pronounced immediately, pinching her undershirt between her fingers and pulling it away from her skin with a grimace. This drew a huff that was almost a laugh from Squall who nodded and the two of them took an unconscious step away from each other as they passed through the turnstiles heading into Garden.

Their walk through the main hall up to the dorms drew a small amount of attention. Not unusual from Squall’s perspective, just about everything he did drew attention these days. It was a kind of low key annoyance that he bore without comment. Being the center of attention was not anything he actually wanted, still didn’t, he was forced to admit that nominating himself for a long term infiltration mission was likely at least sort of motivated by that. They separated with a glance to their different areas of the dorms, He didn’t miss the communal showers of the cadet areas. Heading up to his room and stripping off his training gear, setting aside the shear trigger to be thoroughly cleaned after he’d had a bite to eat. 

Standing in his shower cubicle he could admit to himself while scrubbing down the day’s sweat and dirt that he’d had fun. Not only had he had a good fight where he’d been challenged, but teaching someone who listened and didn’t inanely question every little thing had been rewarding. He even found himself warming up to the idea of being taught in return. A genuine smile, they came a lot easier than they used to, but they’d become scarce again as of late. The burden of responsibility, the deteriorating shape of the world. 

Esthar was stable, but more than a third of the city was in ruin, another third embattled. Stable though, Esthar had a powerful military and now that the fronts had shrunk enough they could hold just fine. The city center was more overcrowded than Deling and the standard of living had dipped noticeably. That was something to worry about once the Lunar Cry’s wave was settled. It would be years (a decade probably) until monster numbers settled to whatever their new normal was.

Galbadia was… a mess. He hoped that this action with Fujin could clean that up, or at least tip the balance. He’d prefer the city states over the empire if he could help it. Whichever side was more inclined to work with them was preferable to the ongoing war. He considered they could do a lot of good by removing the third parties like the Geezards. Other small opportunistic rebel groups, bandits, revolutionaries. It was explosive; and that was a generous interpretation. 

He furiously scrubbed at his scalp with a cleanser trying to chase the turn of his thoughts. He had some time yet before the field exam and the beginning of the assignment. He already knew where he was leaving authority, the chain of command was already established. It was just the matter of letting go of it all and focusing on the task that was to be in front of him. Something he used to have no problem doing. 

He couldn’t just ignore the wider picture anymore. He cared about other people, and it felt good to know they cared about him as well. Even though he wished he could turn it off now and again. That thought drew a rusty chuckle from him as he turned off the water and stepped out to towel off. 

He had a good feeling that things were looking up.

\-------------------

Fujin stood nude in the showers looking at three others, two males and one female. She gripped her little container of toiletries as she processed, listening with half an ear to the threats. She gathered they felt she was a traitor, no matter what the facts were. No matter the feeling of the people actually involved in it all. She tested her footing; looking between the three of them and considering whether yelling would get her anywhere.

“Not so tough now you cold blooded traitor, huh? Think you can humiliate SeeD and not get some?” She focused on the speaker. Ah, that was a better explanation. That was the cadet who’d challenged her to an exhibition match in front of the class, and lost. Badly. So badly it had earned her detention when she’d made him eat his words. And her fist. 

“PITIFUL.” She pronounced, interrupting him and leaving him sputtering.

“Watch your mouth you bitch!” he said, stepping up. Too hopped up on superiority to think he stepped up and threw a punch straight at her. He was no Dincht though and though he was fast, probably junctioned, she’d not been without junction for years, the reflexes honed over dozens or maybe hundreds of fights. She stepped into and past the punch and his head made a sound like a melon as it impacted the tile, cracking them and causing a spray of blood from the site as she grabbed his chin and folded him backward.

There was a stunned instant before the others reacted. The girl was coming at her with a tonfa, Fujin’s hand was up and a thunderous crack lit the room as the girl spasmed, flung backward carried by the bolt of lightning, left twitching on the floor trying to stagger her way up to her feet. 

The last boy who had lost his smirk turned to run even as his legs became solid blocks of ice to the knee. By this moment the first boy had staggered drunkenly back to his feet; one hand on the back of his head, he had managed to draw one of the short swords on his belt and took a few steps toward her, thrusting the sword at her. Unfortunately she had no real recourse to avoid being run through besides grabbing the blade with her bare hand and dealing with the burning pain of pushing it away while she wound back her foot and slammed her toes into his groin with enough force to leave him bug-eyed, gasping, and seemingly completely unable to breath. He toppled, collapsing to the floor with her blood on his sword, mixing with the stagnant water on the tile and some of his own blood to boot. Fujin grabbed her towel and ran past the tonfa wielding girl still struggling on the floor into the hallway, startling a student carrying her books. She looked from the nude woman with the badly bleeding hand.

“Di-did you need doc~” but she was interrupted by a commanding glare from Fujin.

“FACULTY! NOW!” she said, sweeping a pointing finger sharply and causing the girl to nearly drop all her things as she ran back toward the faculty station near the entrance. 

“Help! I need help at the girl’s showers!” she screamed as she ran drawing attention as heads poked out of rooms to see what the commotion was about and the yelling. Fujin stalked back into the bathroom as the girl she’d given a taste of Thundara had found her feet and was in the middle of trying to carefully thaw her friend’s feet off the tile with poorly shaped fire.

He managed to get one syllable of a warning out before Fujin kicked a second person in the groin, drawing a sharp squeak as the woman flailed her Tonfa out in a warding sweep and spun to face Fujin who clenched her bleeding hand in her towel and stood defiant already gathering a spell as the girl charged her. Their proximity forced her to block a full bodied swing of the club with her forearm and shoulder, feeling something jar badly or even break as the small cold tile room became an abrupt gale of sorcery. The girl was thrown into the ceiling with a scream cut off by a grunt then hurled into the wall with enough force to drive the wind from her lungs. It also bent the frozen boy and caused him to topple in a very uncomfortable way hitting his arm, back and shoulders on the tile with a dull thud. As a bonus, flinging the still unable to stand third boy into the wall as well drawing more breathless wheezing from him as he finally gave up the ghost and vomited all over the tile.

She surveyed the devastation, reminded of a fight in a bar in Deling. She walked casually through the bathroom to kick the dry heaving boy in the head, drawing a sharp cry that turned into a sob as she planted her wet heel on his temple and ground it in for good measure.

“COWARD. WORTHLESS. PITIFUL. IDIOT.” she pronounced and shoved his head with her foot. She stalked away, going to stand near the door. Holding off channeling any magic to repair her wounds, so she’d have proof. It was about twenty seconds later when the cadet returned with a SeeD Fujin didn’t recognize. He paused outside the bathroom looking through the doorway at the nearly nude Fujin holding the now bloody towel to maintain some modesty.

“What happened here cadet?” he asked sharply eyeing Fujin with suspicion.

“ATTACKED. REVENGE.” she said sharply pointing a hand inside. The SeeD considered a moment before stepping past her into the shower room, surveying the damage of the brief but intense fight.

“They attacked you?” He asked looking back at her questioningly, to which she nodded and the boy with his feet frozen to the floor started sputtering.

“W-We didn’t do shit, we were just talking to her and she hauled off and slammed my friend’s head into the tile! When we tried to defend ourselves she did this to us!” he said turning red in the face and pointing at Fujin. The SeeD looked back at Fujin who looked highly offended at the suggestion. 

“NUDE?! SHOWER! DRESSED!” she yelled at the accusing boy stomping a foot and showing off the bruise on her arm.

“Fuck you! You attacked us first!” The girl growled out her voice struggling to rise as she got air in her lungs. 

“LIAR.” Fujin said starting off toward the girl with murder in her eye, the girl flinched and held her Tonfa and arms over her head. The SeeD stepped up putting a hand on Fujin’s shoulder.

“Hold on.” He said authoritatively pulling up a radio. “Backup to the girl’s showers in the dorms…” he started as Fujin jerked her shoulder away from the SeeD and returned to glaring darkly at the girl. Within another two minutes there were two more SeeD in the bathroom separating and interrogating everyone involved in the little fight. A group of cadets had gathered outside the shower and the whispering had become a dull roar of speculation. 

“Cadet Laskota, you’re going to come with us.” one of the SeeD said to her as she seethed internally still stinking of sweat and blood, nearly naked but for a towel and bare-footed.

“FUCK.” she growled, but complied.

\-------------------

It was a further twenty minutes before all four of them were taken out separated by SeeD to the holding area. Calls were made, and information passed as the Garden rumor mill swirled and built at least two versions of events. It was nearly half an hour after that before Squall appeared, showered and sharp in his uniform to the holding area. 

“What’s going on?” he asked one of his SeeD as they compared notes in a small group.

“Commander!” they all snapped to attention for a moment on reflex before reading the unamused expression on his face.

“U-uh, that is, there’s two versions of events, here’s the facts. The shower’s a mess, four wounded cadets. They’re cadets Terma, Simmon, Fallha, and Laskota.” The SeeD listed from his pad, Squall’s eyes narrowed.

“Terma’s got frostbite on both legs from being flash frozen to the floor, major bruising from an uncompensated fall on his back and shoulders. Improper junction maintenance suspected, he got off easy. Simmon has bone deep bruises on her back and side, minor concussion, lichtenberg scarring consistent with high power electrical impact bruising around her genitals consistent with blunt force trauma…” Squall listened to the recounting of wounds with unhidden shock, to his mild surprise the list continued.

“Fallha had it worst probably though. Concussion, cuts on the back of his scalp matching some shattered tile in the showers, bruising consistent with a second blow to the head, and a shattered testicle. Laskota got off lightest, defensive cuts on one hand where she says she grabbed Fallha’s blade to stop him stabbing her, and a fractured ulna, hairline where she says she was hit by Simmon’s Tonfa. Wounds are consistent with the weapons. I’d say it was pretty open and shut, but for how badly the three of them were beaten…” he started only for another SeeD to start up.

“They say they went to talk to Laskota about something that had happened in class, admitting they shouldn’t have been in the showers in the process, they’ve already had detention assigned for it. Insist that cadet Laskota was acting erratically and attacked them, injuring her while they tried to escape her and she lashed out with Paramagic.” The SeeD relayed as Squall listened intently his face set in a scowl.

“Laskota says she was planning to take a shower after training with you all afternoon…?” the second SeeD asked which Squall nodded and a note was quickly scribbled. “And she was followed in and accosted by the three others, who berated her, called her a traitor and tried to intimidate her, after Fallha attacked her she defended herself and dispatched all three of them then called for help. That part is confirmed at least. No other witnesses, though most of the floor heard once the fighting started. Hard to miss a Thundara and Tornado being cast. Why does the cadet have that kind of para in the first place, isn’t it a bit of hazard for a trainee to have high level magic?” the SeeD asked and Squall gave her a look that made her question her whole career.

“Cadet Laskota is a veteran of the second sorceress war, as well as an AWOL mercenary for the last three years. It’s in her records if any of you pulled them up...?” he asked expectantly and the three SeeD shared a glance and the third finally spoke up, albeit softly.

“We, that is, I saw that she had been AWOL and mentioned it… I saw she was involved in the war, but the rest of her files were, um, r-redacted. Sir.” he said and Squall’s brows furrowed from angry into confused. 

“Redacted? Whatever. Now you know.” he said making a dismissive gesture with one hand.

“Yes, commander, with that information it kind of explains how, um, devastatingly one sided this all was.” The first SeeD said, flipping back through his notes. 

“Compile the report. I expect it soon. I’m smelling a court martial.” Squall said, the mere words sending the SeeD scrambling. Squall looked around the room there was a furious energy now, He took his time, standing in the room as a visible reminder of the urgency of the task. Then he walked down to the holding cells, the first he came upon was one of the Cadets, Simmon if he remembered correctly. She was sulking, sitting hugging her knees on the cot in the room. It took her a moment before she noticed him and jumped up to snap a salute.

“C-commander!” she squeaked, the heavy armored crystal barrier making her much quieter. He heard noise from the other cells at her shout.

“Cadet.” he acknowledged her, standing with his hands held loosely behind his back considering her. She immediately started to fidget. 

“She attacked us first commander! You have to believe~” Simmon begged her hand snapping forward as she pleaded, only to be interrupted by Squall’s commanding tone.

“Shut up, Simmon. The reports are being compiled now. The scene is being investigated. Your statements have already been taken and I’m not interested in hearing them.” he said with a sharp glare that had her nearly choking on her words as he stalked away he heard her start crying. 

The next cell Cadet Terma stood at attention, he too looked like he badly wanted to talk but having heard him dress down Simmon he swallowed it, but Squall could see the fear and anxiety and guilt falling off him in waves. 

“At ease, cadet.” he said loud enough to be heard and the young man relaxed a little bit, opened his mouth then shut it again, watching Squall walk by without looking at him again. 

In the third cell the cadet was half sitting up his legs carefully apart on the cot, his face a mask of cold sweat.

“Fallha.” Squall pronounced.

“Sir.” the young man was defiant. He had a look of seriousness to him that radiated a restrained anger, though not at Squall. 

He saw no reason to say more to the young man and walked past to the fourth and final cell. Fujin stood up near the barrier, dressed in a bathing robe, a towel as her only other clothing, wrapped around her waist as a kind of secondary skirt. Her eye burned with anger, the ugly empty socket accusatory. 

“LEONHART.” she said sharply.

“Your statements are accurate?” he asked diplomatically and she softened slightly and nodded.

“There will be a court martial, I’m pushing it for tomorrow morning. All four of you will stay here overnight until it begins.” They locked eyes and his face smoothed out, the sternness and anger drifting off to apathy, her anger flowed with it and a sort of hopeful look fluttered through her face, the corner of his mouth pulled back as he glanced toward the other cells and she huffed visibly.

“Cadet.” he said by way of farewell, she snapped a salute but said nothing. He walked away a bit lighter about the whole thing though a glance at the three other cells brought a measure of anger that he didn’t let go until he was in his room and lying down. 

\-----------------

The trial was swift as justice could be. The three investigating SeeD and acting administrative counsel were there along with all four of the accused one at a time. Squall kept his own counsel for most of the proceedings. 

The facts were laid out and he voted with the majority in each case. Expulsion for Simmon and Fallha stripped of the GFs, and sent packing within the day in disgrace. There had been some discussion over Simmon, but her role and close known association with Fallha ultimately damned her. 

Fallha received no such consideration. His humiliating defeat and seething were common knowledge even amongst those who hadn’t been there. This was a clear crossing of the line even if it was never agreed who threw the first punch. He had been in the showers armed and junctioned, same as Simmon. 

Terma however caused a great deal of debate. He had been present, knowing or not, to at least intimidate a fellow cadet. However no one could or would lay any of the hostilities beyond his accessory to others crimes, he had been unarmed, and as his injuries could attest, not even fully junctioned. After a long debate he was placed on probation. He had been on the edge of tears the entire proceedings. He left the court without his head held high, but clearly in higher spirit than he’d entered. 

Last was cadet Laskota. She stood defiantly in her uniform, staring down the court as if daring them to accuse her. And so they did. Excessive violence against another cadet. Two counts. Failure to defer to the proper authority, vigilantism. And the maiming of another cadet. Ultimately, chastened, she was let go with probation, a black mark on her record, and an admonishment reminding her of her duty to retreat and defer to an authority if something like that happened again. 

Squall found himself pleased with the result, even if he had suggested only a warning for Fujin. It could have been much worse. He sincerely doubted anyone in Garden would try that again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've found that I have some serious drive for this story right now due to joining the Island Closest To Hell discord server. to which this fic is now officially attached. Check the collection for other works by the members. As always I would love to hear thoughts and criticisms of my work, it is the best way for me to grow as an author. Thank you for taking the time to read my work and I hope it is enjoyed.


	5. Examination

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Learning a new skill leads to a fateful decision and unexpectedly dark memories dredged up by the smallest thing. Grief is sharp like knives. A Guardian falls.

The same day she had faced down her court martial she poked her head into Squall’s office after her last session for the day.. His head shot up as his door opened.

“Fujin?” He sounded surprised, she frowned as he stood up.

“SESSION?” she asked, and he looked puzzled.

“Oh, you. Well. I should have expected that, honestly.” He muttered to her private amusement. He reached down and hesitated before lifting Lionheart’s case. 

“I need to swing by my room to get my training blade. I had imagined you might not want to deal with anything right now. But I suppose training is a catharsis on its own, huh?” He said and she nodded in agreement with a commiserate smirk.

They walked together in companionable silence toward the dorm complex, interrupted by a brunette blur that walked up and slapped Squall on the elbow.

“Hello, Commander! Fujin!” she skips a step throwing out her arms only for Fujin to recoil a step. Selphie pauses, eyes wide with a dawning look of horror.

“Oh, sorry~!” she sings, her hands clapping together in front of her chest. Face morphing into a blinding grin. 

“I got excited, I wanted to say I’m glad things worked out… um, mostly in your favor.” she stumbles for a moment unsure, but recovers. She sticks her tongue out and holds up a hand high above her head. ‘High five for favorable outcomes!” 

She is left hanging a full four seconds while Fujin fixes her with the most disbelieving expression. Selphie, despite this, absolutely refuses to budge or break character. Fujin, admitting defeat, gives the much shorter woman a desultory high five which gets a cheer from the smaller woman. 

Selphie hops back a step and, seemingly remembering her original purpose, rounds on Squall who is looking on with completely undisguised amusement at Fujin’s bewilderment. Squall schools his expression as the brunette puts on a business face that looks more like she’s mildly disappointed than anything to be talking about something that isn’t fun.

“The official transfer of authority paperwork you asked to be drafted is on your desk.” she announced. Squall gave her a nod and his face drew into a suspicious frown as Selphie took on a particularly impish cast looking between Squall and Fujin.

“You two have fun now~!” she said in a particularly suggestive way then bolted away at her usual manic pace before Squall had a chance to do more than make a ruffled noise of protest or Fujin a snort of offense. The two of them watched her go and then glanced at each other. The lingering eye contact had just enough time to become uncomfortable before Squall’s eyes slid away almost the same time Fujin blinked.

“...let’s go.” he said softly and she merely fell into step beside him again, the comfort of their walk becoming heavy with awkwardness. 

“Goddamnit, Selphie…” he muttered.

“SECONDED.” Fujin huffed stiffly.

\--------------

Squall and Fujin stood collecting after dispatching a few bite bugs that had wandered into their training session. 

“Good trigger work.” Squall commented, breaking the silence they had settled into as they dispatched the nuisances. Fujin looked over and acknowledged his praise with a grunt.

“LACKING.” she commented and Squall mulled her meaning for a moment. 

“It took me years to reach where I am.” He stated, cleaning her sword he was still using from the bite bug ichor. It was an inelegant weapon. In truth Fujin had spared some attention to watch him with a normal sword, she saw the legacy of his gunblade use on the way he used her sword. 

It was interesting that his instruction had given her a little insight into the way he fought. What she’d initially considered a personal flaw had a lot to do with his weapon. The gunblade was a patient weapon. Only six triggers before the weapon was a slightly awkward sword itself. Reloading was slow. Seifer’s gunblade had been magazine fed. Each trigger offering far less power, the blade lighter and faster. She was lost in thought as Squall walked over and tapped her bicep with two fingers. 

“Something on your mind?” He asked, she visibly struggled with the answer. He waited idly bouncing the tip of the sword as he bled off the back end of the combat high.

“...GUNBLADES.” She said turning the shear trigger over in her hands. Popping the cylinder and reloading the spent casings that smoked with released energy.

“Hm?” Squall asked, his eyebrow rising a bit. It wasn’t unusual for her to think about things deeply, he often caught her lost in thought, but she was usually better at hiding it. He’d gotten used to her on their long walk through Galbadia and their often brief conversations lended her more humanity than he’d given her credit for when she’d been in Seifer’s shadow. He felt a bit of guilt at the thought but it was in the past, he was giving her a fair chance now, that was the best he could do.

“The differences between this model and Hyperion. The larger magazine with lower yield with a lighter blade versus a heavy blade and the implications on combat style. I’d never really thought about it. I’d picked the Chakram to specialize in to leave a hand open for shaping and.. and because it complimented the p~ T-the others.” she stumbled. Her face turning away at the difficulty. There was a long beat of mutual discomfiture before Squall spoke up.

“...I did train with both major models before settling on this one. If you were interested in trying the one-handed models…” he suggested slowly, clearly on eggshells. The delicacy in the wording of his suggestion sent a shiver up her spine. She’d held Hyperion on occasion. Seifer was very proud of his weapon and always eager to show it off to anyone who would let him. It was an idle fantasy of hers to use it more than once.

The thought of wielding a similar weapon was at once intimidating and thrilling in a nearly illicit way. Grasping a tiny piece of the boy who was one of her best friends for so much of her life. A chance to redeem some part of his memory. 

“...I want to try.” she said so quietly he paused to give her as much space as he could standing a step away. He nodded slowly after another minute of her turning the blade over in her hands. He left it to her, walking to pick up the box and set the back of the blade on his shoulder. 

“We should be able to make it to Balamb before the shops close up if we go now.” he said softly and she started to walk after him without really looking up. The silence of their long walk was heavy with unspoken feelings and old pain. 

\--------------

They reached the gates of Balamb and Fujin banished her outward melancholy, schooling her face and walking a step behind Squall. She was used to the enforced neutrality of the faces of the people of the town. Three years was not long enough to forget occupation and the face of the leader. She was distantly polite and so were they. Squall handled the conversation with the weaponsmith, glancing back at her for confirmations. 

They walked away from the shop with a fairly basic one handed semi-automatic model gunblade with a comfortable length. She held it in her hands as Squall juggled the carrying cases for it as well as his and her scabbard. She was too busy holding the blade in her hands as they walked to notice his carefully concealed struggle. He let her carry her own weight as they put the town behind them. He carefully set down the accumulated cases before walking over to her and putting a hand gently on her arm. She jumped, her head snapping to him. His firm but unyielding grip stopped her lashing out on instinct which she was grateful for. 

“Okay.” he said softly, with all the care he’d shown her when aligning her on his own weapon. 

“The one handed model is a duelist’s weapon. Finesse is far more important than strength. Here.” he stepped up like he had the previous day laying his arm along hers, the back of her shoulder touching his chest as he held her hand straight with her elbow slightly cocked. He let her take the weight of the weapon and she could feel the strain of the weight on her extended arm. 

The blade was thin with the same gentle slope that the revolver had had, though the tip was much sharper. Equally suited to thrusting as slashing. Her hand naturally turned just slightly to balance the blade and her mind shivered. 

She couldn’t help but see a white jacketed sleeve overlaying her arm. She nearly dropped the weapon as her arm twitched. Squall’s hand jumped off hers and he backed away just an inch but her shoulder felt cold at the sudden absence. Her heart leapt into her throat, and she audibly swallowed with great difficulty. Her grip on the gunblade snapped back, white knuckle, so hard that her hand trembled. She held it until the ghost passed and Squall’s hand slowly came back to rest on hers, more gingerly. He stepped back up.

“Do you want to keep going?” he said softly, the warm air of his breath tickling her ear and sending a shiver down her spine. She opened her mouth, took a slow breath in then let it out in a shuddering gasp.

“YES.” she said with a conviction she did not wholly feel but his grip on her hand firmed again, a support. 

“Your wrist should remain straight as you swing. Don’t let it flop or it will be very hard to maneuver…” he coached her softly, the tingle in her spine never quite leaving even when he went to stand in front of her to give her something to swing against. The memory lingered on in her skin along with the gooseflesh.

\---------------

Squall found himself standing down a one handed gunblade and it was difficult not to imagine a cocky smirk on her face for the first moments. Her face was an icey mask of concentration as he instructed her and as needed made small adjustments to her stance and movements, going over the basic strokes. In many ways it was relearning the techniques himself. 

He found himself imagining Seifer and his exaggerated movements. He was a talented fighter; but he always behaved with flourish even, no especially, when it was unnecessary. The exaggeration and grandstanding served an excellent lesson however, it meant his tells and motions were always obvious when they sparred. He could not help but place himself in the taller man’s boots thinking about the bones and muscles. Where the tension was, where the motion led. 

There was much he only could speculate upon though. Fujin would have to fill in the gaps. But the basics Squall still remembered, it gave him an opportunity in his own way to think about Seifer. He had tried not to. They had fought every step of the way, even before his broken memories began. They were close, in a bizarre way. To find out he was dead was… well, not surprising, but left him melancholy. 

Fujin’s choice to change tools so late in her career was shocking. He would not have guessed she had made the choice like she said she did. Well he wouldn’t have before. As he learned about her he found her to possess a much deeper character than he’d imagined. That was a personal failing on his part. He’d mentally relegated her to a bit part in a greater struggle against Seifer. Their conflict had always been the driving force between his and Fujin’s interactions. The blonde had been a spectre over them both. Even now he still was, and yet, the color of his shadow had changed. 

Without him there to shake the image or say something inflammatory, it was easier to remember his better moments. His strength of character, his steadfastness, courage. He was shaken from his reverie realizing Fujin hadn’t swung at him in a solid minute, she had a dark look on her face, the red of her eye almost lost in the shimmer of unshed tears. The tip of the gunblade drooping. He was not the only one lost in thought, likely in memory. This was difficult for him, but how much harder must it be for her. He set the sword she had brought down, as she questioningly lowered the ‘blade all the way.

“S-STOPPING?” she balked at her own quivering voice. He chose not to comment on that or give her time to fall onto herself about it.

“I’m remembering, It’s distracting me pretty badly.” he admitted, distraction when someone was swinging a brand new razor edged weapon at you was a pretty good reason to either let go of the distraction or not have them swing at you.

Fujin looked like she wanted to talk but something stopped her, she swallowed hard but it didn’t look like it helped much. She turned her back on him suddenly, the hand gripping the gunblade had gone white knuckled again. Gripping it so tightly it carried the motion of her trembling hands.

“Dammit.” she muttered bringing her hand up to her face as the trembling headed up to her shoulders.

“DAMN IT.” she barked, her voice absolutely furious as a tiny hiccup of a sob escaped.

Squall stood looking at the woman paralyzed by his own experiences. He knew what Rinoa would have wanted him to do. He could not imagine a world where that would be welcomed by Fujin. He raised a hand, hesitated with it raised between them. He felt his face tighten, let his heart firm, then rested it on her shoulder. Her head turned toward the hand, the shaking got a little bit worse, or maybe he could just feel it better now. Her chin turned away from him, so he was staring at the back of her head.

“DONE CRYING.” She rasped. It didn’t sound like a statement. In his silence she spoke again bringing her hand to her face. It muffled her words a bit.

“FORWARD.” She hissed. The word snaking out of her lips venomously.

He considered carefully, as the silence stretched, his hand still resting on her shoulder. Eventually the worst of it seemed to pass and he gathered the courage to try to do more.

“I want to help, if you want me to.” He finally spoke the words were soft, but sincere. Just like that she let out a small sound, not a moan, that turned into a sob and the crying began in earnest. Her shoulders shaking as the floodgates broke and even with her back to him he could tell it was ugly. He’d thankfully never cried like this in front of someone. 

But, he had cried like this. Nearly a month after Rinoa had left he’d been unable to breath or even really move for nearly an hour, it had come upon him like a summer storm, sudden and heavy. He watched the flush crawl up her neck and tightened his grip, letting her know he was still there. Her hand pulled off her face and grabbed his fingers. Hers were damp, cold, and grimey. 

They stood in the dipping sunlight until the episode passed. As the sobs passed to sniffling and then to deep ragged breathing he gently grasped the slide of her gunblade and pulled it from nerveless, shaking fingers without a word. He gently let go of her shoulder but she didn’t let him go, after a moment she squeezed his fingers almost painfully tight before releasing them. He silently packed up the protective cases, slinging his gunblade and hers, affixing her scabbard to her case as well, cinched them up tight to his body before he turned back to her. She was taking deep breaths with her chin faced up toward the setting sun. She was silhouetted against the warm Balamb sunset casting her pale skin with a watercolor palette of warmth. He stepped back up to her setting his hand on her shoulder again, she did not obviously react besides her back straightening slightly.

“I’d like to take a walk on the beach before we go back. Join me?” he asked, giving her an out from walking back to Garden with the evidence all over her face.

“Yes.” she said in a startlingly tired voice. She sounded like she had been hollowed out and refilled with water from the deepest part of the ocean, thick with pressure and cool darkness. He slowly walked past her, letting his hand drop away and giving him the first glance at her face. 

It was exactly as red and blotchy as he’d imagined. The muscles of her jaw were tight still, the tear track so bright it looked painted on. She looked him in the eye as he passed, and whatever she saw softened her face significantly. He didn’t know if that was good or bad, was it helping, or hiding, he couldn’t yet tell. So he looked forward, with their gear on his back and walked toward the beach, past the rolling hills of the warm island. 

They walked in silence, it was a hollow kind of silence. Where often there was a fullness to their quiet, this one begged, yawning, for words that neither wanted to speak. Squall held his tongue, afraid he was projecting his own feelings into her, afraid to impose on her emotions, afraid of belittling her grief through comparison. It held him paralyzed and he let it fuel his steps. The soft sound of the water rushing up the shores. The sound of gulls above and the strong scent of the endless blue ocean were balm to shaken nerves. He didn’t look back, he could hear Fujin just behind him. He heard her deep breaths, her small pained swallows. He couldn’t look back. It felt too much like intrusion.

Fujin’s silence was softer. She was bitterly, passionately angry. Angry at herself, angry at Seifer. Absolutely furious with her loss of composure. 

And yet.

Her eyes burned, her arms felt leaden, she had to consciously stop her feet from dragging. The skin of her face felt tight and hot, her throat was frozen in a way that barely let her breath. But it was getting easier with every step. 

As the pain receded there was a lightness, a kind of euphoric freedom, like some absolutely suffocating weight had been lifted off her for just a moment. The feeling was fleeting, like the tight pain in her throat; soothed by the cool salt wind. The tears that soaked her face and her shirt dried, leaving behind a raw sensitivity that made the sun feel so deliciously warm on her. Her hands that had been shiveringly cold and heavy like dead frostbitten lumps had thawed and in the painful static haze that followed had left them feeling light as it faded, relaxed in a way she had only pretended to be. 

She looked at the back of Squall, his slightly hunched shoulders, the tightly controlled gait. She could see now that he was vexed. She kept her mouth shut, though she had regained the power to speak. The space between them felt like a gulf, her shoulder tingled with the memory of his hand and hers rose and hovered in the air between them. She hesitated, would he see it as weakness? Was he angry? He didn’t seem angry, but he rarely seemed angry. She wished she knew better. She couldn’t really read him, she’d never had to. It had never been important, but now she wished she had. Eventually her hand fell back down to her side. If he brushed her hand away… What? Why did it matter? But it did. She couldn’t put her finger on why immediately, but it mattered. It mattered a great deal that what he was feeling was not directed at her, that she hadn’t caused it.

A hundred meters down the beach and he stopped, she nearly collided with him because she was so lost in thoughts. He started to turn, then paused.

“I…” he started but never finished the thought. Again, her hand raised and she found the strength to grasp his shoulder. It was tentative, she almost didn’t again, but not knowing would kill her.

He turned around when she touched him. They looked each other in the face. His eyes roved her face, her arms. The traces of her crying were nearly invisible, all the same she seemed somehow smaller, like some presence had been banished from her. Her eye though, was clear and shining. Pure glistening red like a drop of molten rose glass. And just like that the impression was gone and she seemed herself again.

Fujin’s eyes were drawn from Squall’s hands to his shoulders to his neck. Tension flooded away from him as he looked at her. She couldn’t guess what he saw but all at once it was like he had been flinching from a blow that never came and saw it was never coming. She felt the fool for not reaching out sooner. His eyes for an instant held such relief it drew her to look closely. She’d looked him in the eye many times. Never had she really stopped to look at his eyes though. Steely blue. Grey blue, softer than blue, but more than grey. It was such a strange color that for a moment she was captivated and they stood staring in silence. 

Unable to take the rising tension she spoke.

“I’m going to wash my face.” she said and broke away. He looked confused a moment before watching her walk into the surf. The water rising up her boots and surely getting to her socks but she looked like she didn’t care. Closing her eye tight and pulling off her eyepatch she grabbed handfuls of cool sharp water and splashed it in her face. The distraction was exactly what she needed to get her mind in order and think about what she wanted to say. Because she did want to talk, she found. She took a few handfuls of water and wet her hair as well pushing it back out of her face. The clear blue water revitalized her and she stood up with the cold feeling of water dripping down her back and into her boots as she trudged out of the surf to Squall who was still standing on the beach, frozen. 

“I’m sorry.” she said softly, running her hands through her hair and putting back on her eye patch.

“Why?” Squall asked confused, then before she could elaborate he continued.

“I’m the one who should apologize, making this whole thing awkward. I got stuck in my own~” but she interrupted him.

“Stop.” and he did. There was a pause before she spoke again..

“I just. He was, It…” she stumbled, held her breath for a moment as both of them looked anywhere but each other. She reached into her pocket, pulled out her smokes and his lighter, lighting it before turning his lighter over in her fingers while she started talking with the lit smoke in her mouth mangling her normally precise enunciation. 

“Seifer. He was, well, he was the first friend I can remember. We were always together. He had his dorm room at the edge of the male section, mine was at the edge of the female section. Next door. We got up together, had all our classes together. For years, you know?” and she let out a slight laugh. “Raijin was his roommate, and well, I don’t remember when we met…” she said and he let it slide, they both knew why. “But he looms so large, for so much of my life. Then six months and-” she made an expanding pantomime with her hands. “Boom, it’s all gone.” She said, puffing furiously at the stick in her lips. Squall didn’t have anything to say right away.

“We.” he hesitated, then looked at her pleading look and continued. “We acted like we hated each other sometimes, I think.” he couched. She let it slide without comment. “But, he drove me to be the best. Which of us was at the top of the class changed almost day to day, remember?” she nodded gravely. 

“It-It always made him frustrated, but he’d always smile and say ‘I’ll take it back’, heh.” Fujin added with a smirk.

“That sounds like him. I… I never hated him. Not really. I think a lot of people thought I did. He might have, even…” the thought trailed off as Fujin considered the shrinking smoke, keeping her own counsel. 

“He was… He was so big. And not like, tall, but just...” Squall waved an arm as words failed him. Fujin nodded.

They stood again in silence for several moments. 

“Did you… we should get back.” looking up at the starscape slowly revealing itself above them as the sun sunk ever lower.

“I’m hungry.” she agreed, and she walked up to him. There was a breathless moment before she raised a hand. “Um, do you…” she trailed off as Squall looked down at the straps on his chest then wordlessly handed her back her equipment. She took it, slung it and fiddled with the straps as they started walking back toward Garden.

The silence felt pregnant, filled with unspoken thoughts, but it was warmer now. The empty feeling had fled entirely and in its place there was a kind of manic energy. Like a room about to explode into laughter just looking for an excuse that never comes, unspoken stories, unasked questions. They passed through the gates, walking through a small group of students milling outside the gates who parted as they walked. They made it all the way inside to the fountain, Squall turned one way and Fujin the other. They paused, looked at eachother and she spoke first.

“Tomorrow?” she asked, quietly.

“Tomorrow.” he said with a small smile curling the corner of his mouth that found a way to reach all the way around to curl the other side of hers.

\--------------------

Training every day Fujin felt her skill develop. Their instruction soon became sparring, with breaks for Fujin to teach him bits of shaping lore. This was less successful. Squall was quite set in his ways and it took him a fair amount of time to successfully manage even basic shaping exercises she had mastered so long ago, it felt like baby steps.

Not to disparage what progress he did make, but it was less the sort of free-form skill that Tilmett would casually display or Fujin herself was capable of, and more learning a trick by rote. Fujin was largely happy with this, though happy may be too strong a word. She was satisfied with his efforts, even through his deep frustration that came with each gain.

The week left them behind, the planning stages of the field examination were rearing their head. This meant time for preparatory examinations. The usual choice was the Fire Cavern, even if Ifrit wouldn’t condescend to allow himself to be junctioned to every cadet he was a strong proving ground to find who would crack under life-or-death pressures. Fujin was well beyond such basic tests. Something else had to be found, and the opportunity presented itself. 

The SeeD aquatic assault lander was fairly quiet inside, the bob of the waves beneath the vehicle caused a gentle rise and fall. Fujin and Quistis were both checking over their equipment. Squall originally volunteered to second for Fujin, but he was not technically an instructor so that was vetoed by the education board. He accepted this reasoning easily enough but reminded that the mission was an unknown magical signature that was speculated to be an emergent GF. Figuring this a better use of time than sending her through what would likely be a cakewalk. 

The signature had appeared off the coast of Galbadia in a small group of rocky outcroppings near Winhill Bluffs, a small seaside cave that had long had a reputation for whipping winds had grown into literal screaming. There was a terrible crying heard at sunrise and sunset coming from the area. There had been a few disappearances in the area over the last few months and they were being attributed to the source of the screaming. The lander pulled near to the cliffs as the sun was just peeking over the horizon. There was a sound that was audible even through the walls of the lander, it was a low keening wail like someone in terrible pain. It would come for a few moments then fade only to start again. Everyone in the lander jumped when a truly terrible scream rattled the ship. 

“Well, there’s something out there.” Quistis commented drawing a few low laughs from the two other SeeD present as well as a muffled humph from the faculty member along for recording purposes. 

“Time is… 0437. SeeD team will not interfere with the exam unless forty minutes have passed without word or death is confirmed. Cadet, are you prepared?” Fujin raised her head and nodded, her hands resting on the sheathed Gunblade in her lap. 

“YES.” The faculty member turned his head to Quistis.

“Instructor, are you prepared?” Quistis removed her glasses, setting them in a small protective case which she left in a bit of webbing in the ship. “I am.” she answered.

The front hatch of the lander opened onto a tidal cave on the side of the cliff, the screaming cries mixed with the wind to whip cold sea spray that chilled to the bone immediately. Quistis stepped delicately onto the slick rock keeping her footing with ease, Fujin stepped next to her grinding her boots against the stone to check her footing. The doors of the lander closed behind them leaving them in the pre-dawn wash of the sea. The cold settled deep, stealing warmth. Quistis shivered slightly, her face a pretty grimace. 

“Miserable.” she huffed, Fujin neglected to respond instead stepping toward the cave. Outside the lander, without the metal walls to absorb the shock the keening cries stabbed the ears, both women teetered a moment as the first shriek passed over them. The sound seemed to bypass the ears and go straight to rattling their brain and guts. Balance became difficult as the world seemed to sway and dance with each wail. 

Quistis’ breakfast roiled and she had to swallow fiercely to keep bile out of her mouth. Fujin was even less fortunate having only had a liquid breakfast, she planted a hand on the wall and heaved so hard she almost toppled when combined with the unbalancing effect of the wailing. Seeing the other woman fail to hold back forced Quistis to similarly heave and throw her light breakfast all over the rocks. 

A few moments later, both of them had furiously concentrated against the disorientation and sickness to adjust their junctions which gave them at least some protection against the confusion and illness of the sonic assault.

“Well, whatever it is, it’s powerful.” Quistis commented as she slowly got used to the feeling of the wailing passing through her. Fujin’s poise had been shaken but she steeled even faster. A decisive nod was all the answer Quistis received. 

“HUNT.” Fujin pronounced and pushed into the cave, her gunblade held low ready ahead of her as they picked across the slimy stone floor, avoiding detritus and the odd patch of moss. 

The cave was far deeper than one might have initially guessed and the cold salty breeze flashed around them seemingly coming from both ahead and behind. The water eventually settled to a fine icy sheen upon the rocks, and the screams only got louder, punctuated by long moments of howling, wet wind and paradoxically loud moments of near absolute silence. 

The bodies were an uncomfortable find, they were just bones, picked absolutely clean, like they had been acid washed and coated in a faint rime. The temperature was bordering on frigid as they pushed around a corner in the cave, which opened into a vast cavern covered in stone pillars formed by ages of washing waves and dripping water. Standing near the center over a pile of far fresher corpses the creature strode in small, pacing circles. It was huge, easily twelve feet tall, thin to the point of emaciation but for a round belly; the profile of acute starvation. 

It possessed long, fine hair that fell in waves about it, raven black and iridescent, shimmering blue when the feeble light of the cave caught it right. Feet ended in reptile or perhaps birdlike claws, it was difficult to tell as they were seemingly frostbite black and visibly decaying. It wore a scrap of clothing, like a shawl or burial shroud around it’s shoulders that dragged where it walked. It’s arms were so long that its knuckles would have dragged on the ground if they were left to hang. Instead large bone thin hands with fingers that had too many knuckles turned blue and black with frostbite ended in wickedly sharp black nails that grasped a body. 

At first Fujin thought it a child but no, it was a fully grown man that was merely dwarfed by the tremendous spectre. It cradled the man in its hands, despite the fact he was clearly dead. His skin was blue and black with frostbite and the first signs of natural decay. Quistis gasped and the head of the creature snapped toward them.

“Leave me!” the wind screamed, and it let out a furious, grief stricken wail that slammed into both of them like a physical weight. They finally caught a glimpse of its face through the curtain of hair. The impression of absent eyes, empty sockets crying rivulets of blood. Deep within smoldering embers filled with a terrible weight of rage and loss burned where the bone should be visible. As captivating as this was its mouth. A vast yawning chasm hidden behind almost beautiful lips, each scream revealed endless rows of terrible crooked fangs, disappearing back not down its throat but into an infinite darkness straight past where the back of its head should have been that its voice emerged from. 

“Leave me to my Grief!” The creature howled. 

“NO.” Fujin pronounced grimly. The creature, it seemed, could hear over its own shrieking wind. It staggered to a bony knee and lay the body down amongst the others that were in much more advanced states of decay. It rose and threw its arms wide with a terrible scream that warped the air as it ripped through the intervening space. Quistis and Fujin split diving to the sides into the relative cover of the stoney pillars at the edges of the room. The stone shattered under the force of the scream, it echoed strangely in the space breaking from a single voice into the teary wails of dozens of voices all echoing the same crushing, terrible sadness. It weighed down upon each of them like a physical weight. 

“Then perish!” The creature shrieked and it’s next roar was more of fury than sadness. Rather than the hot weight of anger one would expect of a wild beast it was literally freezing hate that seemed to shake the water from the air into fat snowflakes. Quistis watched Fujin who circled a little deeper into the room, dodging behind stalagmites to dodge the shrieks the beast let loose at her. Finally emerging from cover for only a moment thrusting out a hand that fired a streak of orange, an arrow of Fire that exploded as it struck the creature. 

The fire caused the creature to gasp and recoil, as heartening as that was to so quickly find an effective weapon, the creature seemed to have decided that Fujin was an actual threat and it wasted no motion. Its leap was so long and smooth one would imagine it had glided on wings. There was no need to imagine the devastation it wrecked with it’s emaciated claws though. It swiped overhead bringing a claw down to smash Fujin, missing, only managing to shatter the stone it struck to powder. It’s second swing nearly bowled the pale woman over with the wind of its passing though she managed to avoid the swing. There was the sound of a blade ringing on bone and a sharp blast. The creature recoiled with a screech. 

Quistis took her opportunity and burst from cover to dodge closer to the opening of the room. Letting loose a Fire spell of her own that burst against the creature’s back, much less concentrated than Fujin’s had been but making up for it with raw size and power. This proved a valid kind of distraction as the being rounded on her with two long strides and let loose a screech of fury to keen that not only obliterated the much smaller pillar she had hidden behind but blew her back into the stones earning her a number of lumps and a few cuts to go with them before she rolled to a stop. Quistis staggered to her feet, head spinning, stomach roiling and heart pounding in her throat. The impact had been immense and she was not sure she didn’t have at least one fractured rib from the impact. From the way her head was spinning she almost certainly had a concussion.

Luckily she was spared being screamed into a fine smear on the stones by another two sharp blasts that drew the creature’s attention back. Fujin had abandoned cover and closed to melee slashing freely to begin a very deadly dance with the creature, pausing only to hurl blasts of fire when she had an opportunity. Quistis reached down within herself and grasped the luminescent core of magic that dwells within the hearts of all humans. Grasping at the throbbing core of power she screamed. 

“Hey, Crybaby!” causing the creature to hesitate to look back at her and give Fujin a moment to get clear as the visibly glowing Quistis opened her mouth and vomited a stream of pearly white slime that sizzled ominously wherever it touched stone. It splattered, carving the rock as easily as a child pulling their finger through clay. It struck the creature across the face prompting it to flail blindly as the slime hissed and spit, burning great rents as the sizzling fluid dripped across the ragged wounds left by Fujin’s gunblade. 

After the burning tide subsided Quistis staggered back into cover, with a satisfied smirk hearing the creature’s suffering cries. She slumped against the stone and reached into herself seeking her healing magic to try to revitalize herself. Unfortunately for Fujin she was on her own until Quistis could patch herself up.

Fujin took her moment to cast a spell she only had a few fraying threads of. Vanishingly rare and valuable to any SeeD worth their salt, but even more so one like her. The feeling of being under the effects of Double was difficult to describe. To explain to someone who has never been junctioned it was even more esoteric. Magic felt like so many cords of spellcraft, with each kind of magic having its own unique texture. Casting felt like literally pulling a thread and spooling it out. Every thread had a tension, a will, and fought every step of the way to the point where release was a relief. Double softened the struggle, like it soothed the threads and made them much easier to handle. However different spells were still oil and water, they would not mix and trying to control them and mix them under normal circumstances was impossible. Emulsion theory, however, gave a way. And now she used it. She had to stop and concentrate fully on what she was doing. Quistis’ attack gave her the perfect opportunity under battlefield conditions to risk everything on a very bad, barely proven idea. 

Fujin’s smile was vicious. Her hand opened and magic burst forth. As the roiling ball of barely-contained magic flashed, something new entered the world. 

What happened next made Fujin wish dearly that she had a recorder. The ball struck just under the creature’s arm. The fire swirled, orbiting and immersed in the incredible violent energy borne by the paramagical thread known as Flare. Normally Flare was almost pure energy, striking like a wave of power from a point. Disintegrating what it struck, however forcing Fira to mix with it, Fujin herself was only protected from the blast by the creature’s flailing turning the site away from her. The Flare lit the room like a second sun, utterly blinding herself as she hurried to squeeze her eye shut and shield herself from the explosion. Still, through her eyelid the light was overwhelming. The shriek of the creature was drowned out by the blast. The silence left a ringing emptiness. In that hanging eternal moment of burning white she heard something without the use of her ears. 

“I did not see before.” a soft voice spoke to her. In her mind’s eye Fujin saw the creature, so much smaller, her, for it was definitely feminine, raven hair reaching to her hips. Long clawed arms reaching out. Her hole-like visage no longer burning with anger but again swimming in grief.

“You have been hurt so badly… so badly… They left you… abandoned you… You understand. You know…” The creature reached out to her, not menacing, but pleading, begging even. What else was there to do? Fujin held out a spiritual hand and welcomed the Strigoi to her soul.

\------------------

Quistis opened her eyes, whatever had happened, there was a ghostly shadow on the walls now. Where the stone was just ever so slightly bleached. She staggered up to her feet and looked toward the center of the room. 

The creature was unrecognizable. A charred and disintegrating ashen heap. Nearly half its body had disintegrated and what was left lay still. The silence was so complete she almost shocked herself when her boot squeaked on the stone. It was then she realized that the water was gone, and the air felt thin, like it had all been thrown out of the room and was only just rushing back. Everything that had been able to see the point of the blast was a few shades whiter. 

The immense energy of… of… whatever Fujin had done had been more destructive than any single spell Quistis had ever seen, and she had personally cast Ultima once.

Fujin.

Quistis ran across the room to where she had last seen the woman. She was laid out in a sheltered part of the cave of a strange shape that must have been the creature’s own shadow. Spared the effect of her own magic by fortune. She lay on the stone slumped against a stalagmite. Rushing to the woman and reaching within to absolutely saturate Fujin with restorative power. The unconscious woman’s eye flung open and she gasped a deep breath twitching and flailing with a short scream. Sitting up and looking around, disoriented before she looked down at her hands, then scrambled for her weapon that had landed beside her. 

“Fujin! It’s dead! Whatever you did worked!” Quistis said, a giggle bubbling out of her mouth as she turned her head again to marvel.

Fujin practically leapt to her feet. “ADMIXTURE!” She screamed and let out a frankly demonic cackle throwing her arms up so hard she actually left the ground.

“WORKED! IT WORKED!” she screamed, carrying on and performing some kind of celebratory dance that even Quistis couldn’t help getting caught up in the manic energy of. Quistis followed her with her eyes as she whooped and leapt around the room. The other bodies had been utterly disintegrated where the creature’s body hadn’t blocked for them. But the smell of decay was absent, scent was only just barely beginning to return to the space as Fujin’s wild celebration slowed and the woman was left gasping deep breaths and still bubbling with laughter.

“WAS…. WAS A FORCE.” she managed, regaining some composure and turning to face Quistis, who didn’t have the heart to tell her her celebration had cost her points. 

“Oh? What did it call itself?” Quistis asked, surprised that such a terrifying creature was a Guardian Force, usually they tended more toward the awesome than awful… Even Diablos had been perversely beautiful in its twisted glory.

“STRIGOI.” Fujin relayed coming back to herself, though she couldn’t keep the smile off her face. Quistis couldn’t fault her, she’d had every reason to be proud.

“Mission complete.” Quistis said and looked down at her wrist to find the digital watch she wore still thankfully ticking. “Only took twenty minutes. Hm.”

\---------------------

“Your report was impressive.” Squall said, nimbly parrying Fujin’s sweeping slice and pushing in with a thrust only to be repulsed by a snap kick that forced him back a step.

“DIFFICULT.” Fujin commented as she adopted a fencers bearing and made a few probing thrusts at Squall in return who took them as opportunity to swat her out of stance and deliver a ringing backhand to her chest that forced her to give ground yet again. 

“I can imagine. I’ve fought a few Guardian forces. The ones that~” he was interrupted by a few tight cuts that drive him off the offensive for a moment.

“~That force you to fight them are the most vicious!” he finished clinching them and giving her a shove that drove her off her feet and to the ground, where he stomped on her ankle to stop her rolling away, and planted his blade gently at her side, arresting a swing that would have disemboweled her..

“YIELD.” she said immediately. He stepped off and she tried to stand. Her eye widened and she immediately aborted the motion, pulling air through her teeth in a sharp hiss. Squall knelt down, setting his balde aside and took her boot in his hands gingerly.

“Sorry.” he muttered. 

They were often quite rough, they were after all trying to make up for years of learning the limitations of a weapon with some wildly accelerated training. And with it came fairly frequent injuries. He turned her ankle gently one way then the other, her breathing hitching with each change in direction. 

“Doesn’t seem broken?” he asked, gently grasping her ankle up and down.

“NO.” she agreed, staring at his hands.

“BOOT.” she said, pulling her leg back a bit. He took the message and unlaced it then removed it. Taking her foot in his hands and gently probing with his fingers. She hissed and panted a little when he grabbed a specific spot. 

“Deep tissue bruise feels like… do you have any cure left, or do I need to go stalk down some glacial eyes?” he asked, looking up to her eye with a serious expression.

“HAVE.” she said and reached down, touched his hand and he felt the cure threads twist into his pattern. 

“What? Oh. Well. Here goes nothing.” Squall said and stared down at her foot, his face a mask of concentration. She had been coaching him on shaping more and more. They hadn’t had any major breakthroughs but she took her opportunities to force him to practice. She smiled privately as he concentrated then felt the warm tendrils of restorative magic slide into her foot. She couldn’t resist the urge to sigh as the throbbing pain faded out.

“CAUSED. FIXED.” she pronounced and he got a small smile of his own.

“Just don’t ask me to do it in the middle of combat.” He quipped. He offered her back her boot and she lifted her foot and looked at him expectantly. His put-upon look was clearly half feigned but he pulled it open to let her slide her foot back, he tied it back as it had been without further complaint. He rose to his feet and she rose a moment later beside him.

“Another round?” he asked, lifting his gunblade and giving it a nimble spin on two fingers like only a junctioned person would dare with a weapon so heavy. 

“YES. EXAM.” she said gathering up her blade and clearing the blade of the dirt and grass accumulated from setting it down on her sleeve. 

“Three days.” he agreed, and brought his blade up, his cheerful smile falling behind a game face as they clashed again in the fading Balamb light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The romance part of this story has appeared a little earlier than I expected. But as I put words to paper it all spilled out. I suppose it happened exactly where it needed to.
> 
> I would like to thank the Island Closest To Hell discord server for enableing me to put so many words to paper. I cannot overstate their contribution to my productivity. 
> 
> Please enjoy.


	6. Proving

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Field Exam rears its head, a sleepless night leads into a warzone to seperate the SeeD from the Chaff.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter warning, drug use. Here it is, the penultimate chapter of Arc 1. I hope you enjoy it. 08/17/20

She snapped awake sitting up already swinging a fist at nothing. Fujin’s sheets were damp with sweat and she was huffing like she’d run for an hour. After carefully looking around the darkness of her windowless dorm room she flopped back to the mattress and stared at the nothing. She refused to look at the clock. It would only taunt her. 

The Exam was in the morning, she had managed to sleep a few times. Had even gone to bed early, knowing the jitters were a sign of how it would go. She had spent three years up to her neck in mercenary work, nearly had her throat slit on two different occasions. Had to escape her own employers once. She had blood on her hands and had tasted her own more than she liked to remember. On this list though, somehow, tests rated enough to give her nightmares. She found she couldn’t repress a delirious giggle at the thought. 

She thought back, over all that had happened. The pseudonyms and varying callsigns. The dirty work of it all. Her hands gripped the sheets with a sudden fury. Garden took her back. After everything she did, everything that happened, everything! She was going to be SeeD. The only one of the three. The laughter turned into a single sob. She grabbed her pillow and smothered herself in exasperation. 

No more tears, enough with the tears. Shuffling the pillow up just a bit to allow herself to breath she almost sat back up, but no. Going out into the common room would invite attention and now she wanted to be alone. With her thoughts, her fears, anxieties. 

The fear of failure, yes, it was a distant possibility. She could feel her stomach roil. The faces of the court martial rolled back across the inside of her eyelid. The intensity of it, all of them, looking for fault, for flaw. The mere thought of it made her want to vomit. The judgement triggered another deeper anxiety, something ethereal and half remembered. She could almost feel the hands on her. Struck to the floor, the screaming. The struggling and shouting. There were no faces. The GFs had seen to that. Just like so many SeeD cadets. Orphans, single parent homes, broken families, runaways all had been accepted. Raijin, Seifer, they’d never asked, and now if Raijin did, she couldn’t answer. 

Her parents, she had… fleeting memories of them. Cooking for them, cleaning for them, helping her mother to bed after she stumbled home at night. Half a dozen men who might have been her father, she couldn’t be sure. The faces were gone, the names were like empty static. Still though, the nightmares featured them so heavily. Sometimes the faces were blank or obscure, sometimes they had other people’s faces, people she knew, people she respected, people with power over her, but always twisted in judgement. 

Deciding to try to sleep again was a heavy decision. The ritual might help and she needed all she could get, she stepped out of bed, made sure her door was locked twice, passed a hand over her desk silently, then slid back into bed, making sure her covers were over the whole bed, laid still and forced her body to relax through conscious effort. Wiggling her toes and putting her head back on the pillow before curling onto her side gripping it to her chest with her head still resting on the edge. It was a familiar ritual and it helped her let go of it all, to be sure she was safe enough to sleep. Beneath her pillow inside its case she gripped the folding knife tightly.

\-----------------

They had assembled pre-dawn, twelve cadets and four SeeD filed into the loading bay of the airship Ragnarok. Rapid deployment was the call of the day. It was a four hour flight from Balamb to the beleaguered Esthar City aboard the starship. The southern districts were most hard hit. Being marginally closer to Tears Point and the Lunar Cry that had been ravaging the city. 

The primary purpose of this mission was the reclamation of a manufacturing facility for a badly needed part of the maglev systems the city practically lived on. It had been lost early on, and though a stockpile of the parts was scrounged by decommissioning non-essential vehicles, after three years they truly needed to reclaim the facility or the city may well ground to a halt as all the logical infrastructure collapsed under its own weight. Literally. 

The plan, as it was explained, was to do an aerial insertion onto the factory grounds, SeeD will spearhead the push ensuring the most important internal features remain in working order and eliminating the most deadly monsters. Cadets will be tasked with retaking the grounds of the facility and creating a path through the highway before signaling the Estharian military to make it’s push to do final securing of the facility. 

Mission duration expected to be less than fifty hours under likely conditions on the ground. Collateral to surrounding infrastructure is to be minimized, the Estharian lines are already stretched thin and the forces necessary to create a mag-bridge to transport materials from the reclaimed factory will be sorely needed so they should not be called until the facility is secure. 

Fujin had packed carefully the night before and rechecked it first thing. She had brought what she hoped would be more than enough ammunition, food, water, stimulants, magical refining materials, anything she could think of. The cadet uniform was fairly impractical, and a skirt did not particularly suit her. Regulation is regulation however and she knew she’d lose rank if she didn’t at least follow the letter of the regulation on this front. Though her shorts under the skirt definitely ignored the spirit. They wouldn’t let her wear pants to an active warzone, that was their decision, but she’d not be caught flashing her peers unless that was her aim. A moment of comedy before the dour theater of war.

The flight was tightly packed. There was only strictly speaking room for 10 passengers. However it is easy enough to get some extras in if you’re willing to be a little uncomfortable or have people standing in awkward places. Fujin was in squad three. Her teammates were one of her dorm mates, by coincidence she assumed, and a male named Nant. Fujin knew her roommate primarily through osmosis, listening to the woman talk and exist around her. Karen was a ball of nervous energy and unlike Fujin who reigned in her anxieties about the oncoming exam the woman was a whispered tornado of chatter. A talker at heart, not the most prepossessing trait but something she knew how to handle. Raijin was a talker too, afterall.

The other, Nant, was a full mystery. He was quiet, though rather than stoic in the way Squall was, or discerning like Quistis could choose to be, he seemed simply to be shy. Again, not the most useful trait. She rubbed her fingers over the hilt of her gunblade. An unfamiliar weapon still. Less than two weeks was not enough to master a new weapon. She was passable, Karen had one arm barded to the shoulder with an elaborate armored sleeve, the forearm bulky and studded, her wrist couldn’t turn in it, but it looked heavy and tough. On her other hip was a duster-knife. Brass knuckles and a fairly long blade. Unusual, but Karen wore her equipment without awkwardness. Nant’s weapon was a little more unusual. A four foot polearm with a heavy blade at the apex, it had a handguard and some kind of directional launcher near the top, which he had a slung bandolier of additional ammunition that looked like thick broad-headed crossbow bolts. Karen had asked him about it and he’d eventually been worn down and explained that it was a Centran war lance. 

Fujin breathed slowly. She kept her eye closed much of the time, leaning on her sheathed gunblade. Fingers tracing the grip patterning to soothe herself. Karen was squad leader. Some of her babble was actually about the mission even. They were being expected to hold the south-east corner of the facility. It had a cluster of small buildings that had some obvious monster infestation. Imps and Iron Giants had been spotted flitting about mixed with some as-yet-unclassified creatures. Cries always brought new creatures, unknowns were rarely positive in a business like theirs.

Half an hour from the drop the SeeD lead, a male named Nida explained. Fujin remembered he was one of the ones that graduated with Squall’s group. He didn’t have anything new to tell them, really. Just confirming that contact with Esthar had backed up the assumptions that had been made about the area. It was going to be hot from the first seconds. Land, drop your bags, and then into a fight for their collective lives. A test of ability, of strength, of resistance to stress, and of endurance. Everything one could ask for in a SeeD exam in these uncertain times.

Conversation died to furious whispers. The information putting a damper on spirits all around. The four SeeD were taking note, watching from face to face. Nearly half the remaining SeeD in Garden were being pushed in this mission. Fujin flexed her hands to keep feeling as her heart rate picked up. She rode out the adrenaline surge, keeping a lid on it, knowing she couldn’t risk blowing it out before she even needed it. 

As the ship decelerated Fujin opened her eye. As ready as she would ever be. She looked at the other two. Karen looked like she had swallowed an entire tomato whole while Nant was literally shaking. She could see even past the turbulence of the atmospheric flight that he was trembling. His eyes were hard, staring at the floor, grasping his weapon tightly in both hands, still folded. The calm before the storm. Fujin looked across the room and tried to guess who was going to die. 

\-------

Jumping out of an airship was a new experience. The tallest building Fujin had ever jumped out of in Deling was only about fifty meters high. Falling from twice that gave her enough time to really appreciate the speed she had accumulated. Those willing to potentially be caught in the air had cast Float on themselves, it had been provided to those who asked. Some waited until they were far closer to the ground, trying to cast it as low as they dared. 

She was amongst the few who didn’t cast it at all. The SeeD were amongst first on the ground, they had learned to trust the magic that was bound to their complicated magical knot they called a body. She had learned too. 

The impact with the pavement was titanic. It shook her from her ankles to the top of her head. Every bone protested, but every one stayed in place. The ground shattered under the impact and she stepped out of the crater into the fray. Her gunblade was in her hand, Protect in her palm even as the first creature approached. Her blade swung in thundering arcs, blowing holes into her opposition. Hesitation and fear had to be set aside. 

Every second was a calculation, how to make enough space to fight when to cast and what. As she fought a scream reached her, Karen leaping past her to strike out at an Iron Giant Fujin had engaged heading toward their assigned hold point. Nant was a step behind. Fujin Followed them forward, assuming a stance a step behind them, following Karen’s unfocused casting and furious aggression with more careful spellcraft. Pulling magic and throwing it with aplomb. She spared a glance at Nant. 

The nervous man was ashen with clenched teeth, but he was fighting. He was always a step behind and frequently on the back foot against the monsters they faced. The training center did not prepare one for everything. Twelve foot creatures of living metal would frighten anyone who had never faced down a Galbadian war machine before. 

Being used to working alone for years made it difficult to immediately step back into a supporting role. She had to catch herself from overextending and leaving her team open. Fighting instinct to pursue retreating creatures. She forced herself to lean into her spell-shaping more than her ichor-christened gunblade. She would draw and cross cast, pull from one monster and throw the threads at another. It was difficult not to relish the opportunities to close to melee. 

There was something intoxicating about the kick of a Gunblade’s trigger. Without having to hold back she struck out in brutal arcs and thrusts. It was incredible, almost intoxicating to watch a monster literally split apart. Seeing it happen to bite bugs and the odd caterchaprilla had taught her what to expect. It was another to see it happen to something far tougher. Suddenly Seifer’s attitude toward battle made sense. There was something poetic in the splatter of ichor. In the evisceration of her enemies. All the same her free hand glittered with arctic air, so cold her fingers burned with it and hurled what felt like a thousand razor-like shards of ice across the hot tarmac of the facility. 

The echoing screams of battle sang and her heart pounded. Objectively it had been perhaps five minutes. Taking a moment to look behind her the desperate warzone that was their target zone was mirrored in every other direction she could see. One team was already down to two people. She couldn’t see the third in her glance, but all the sides were holding. 

They pushed, a few steps at a time, burning and shattering, the earth was scarred by the team’s passage. The moon’s spawn were powerful, suffused with frightening energy that Fujin took time to siphon, in her spare moments gathering a wellspring, a veritable tapestry of thrumming spells. It was emboldening and made her freer and freer with her power, She even took a few moments of breathing room after larger more territorial monsters fell to reassess and reassign her junctions. 

The deeper they pushed the more monsters came for them, seemingly endless waves of murderous lunatics.  
\---------

They pushed to the outlying buildings in the first hours of the battle. Karen’s squad assumed their location quickly enough, the route there was mostly open space, though the remaining pair of small buildings was also their responsibility to clear. The eventual way that was dealt with was Karen stood near the wall holding against any creatures that pushed in from the outside of the admittedly fairly broken wall. 

Her aggressive style and admitted lack of magical precision made her more useful as an area fighter and brawler than someone suitable for tight quarters. Or so she said, Nant looked at his war lance and at her armored sleeve but didn’t contradict the woman as she “cleverly” explained why she wouldn’t be doing the inarguably more dangerous job of doing a room by room clear of the outlying buildings. 

As Nant and Fujin moved toward the first of the buildings she looked at him critically. He didn’t meet her eye but walked smoothly enough.

“POINT.” she said, raising her gunblade. The young man looked puzzled a few moments before it dawned upon him and he nodded sharply without saying a word. He’d been utterly silent the whole mission so far. That being settled they checked the door finding it locked. Nant started to consider other entrances but before he’d taken more than three steps Fujin chambered a kick and brust the lock with one well placed heel. 

“OPEN.” she declared as the sound of things moving in the shadows the building started to pick up. The first building proved to be some kind of administration building, many terminals and storage rooms with various little pieces of this and that spread about. The monsters had settled in, building nests of boxes and chairs held together with unidentifiable garbage. 

The years since this building had been lost had taken a toll on it and many of the workstations and rooms were in shambles, holes in the walls and ceilings were not uncommon. Still the two of them fought through. Room by room, pushing up the halls and then alternating which of them did the breach though Fujin led the halls where her slimmer weapon gave her more options when something decided to fight in the confined space. They had to walk by degraded pictures and various personal effects from the former workers of the building. Fujin was inured to the sight of human remains; they had to pick their way past them frequently but Nant was clearly distracted. Whenever they walked past human bones, often picked clean sometimes cracked for marrow, he would hesitate a step. He was extremely careful to not tread upon them as Fujin carelessly would.

“DEAD.” she said sharply, making him jump. He looked at her wide eyed and his voice came out in a squeaky whisper. 

“There’s so many! How can you be so casual about this! It’s like walking through a graveyard!” he exclaimed carefully side-stepping another probably human bone.

“...” She paused, unsure how to communicate her life to this point. She looked down at the bones that had shifted under her boots. Her face pulled from its usual neutral sternness into a sharper scowl.

“NORMAL… CAUSED.” She explained walking on, but Nant merely sputtered and fell back a step.

“What? What do you mean, normal!? What do you mean, caused!? Did you kill these people, I’d heard you were in the galbadian army, but, this was the lunar cry wasn’t it?” He sputtered quick stepping to keep up as they swept the floor to make sure they weren’t leaving anything behind them. In this building before they moved on. Fujin stopped and turned to face the younger man, fixing him with a cool stare.

“HISTORY.” She declared and he just looked entirely puzzled. She looked away and a few moments later elaborated in a husky voice..

“Seifer Almasy caused this. Every monster of that cry is on his head. I’ve walked over a lot of bodies before, fresher than these. ” She explained reluctantly.

“Seifer? Weren't you… I mean... Um… forget I said anything… please.” he stammered, holding his lance in front of him like a ward. She chose not to answer. It was painful enough to admit as it was. 

Facing the consequences of her loyalty was something she couldn’t really make peace with, if she were honest with herself. She told herself she was just trying to save her best friend. She wanted to believe that everything she had done had been justified, or otherwise a consequence of Edea, and Ultimacia’s control. Further self examination had always been something she had avoided. It was easier to leave the question unanswered. No matter that in the quiet moments, her mind would drag the unopened door in front of her again and again.

Fujin’s taciturn direction lapsed into mostly just gestures by the second building. The tension was thicker than the miasma of one of the creatures that had taken up residence. Some sort of six legged furry creature with a poisonous gas that followed it around. Once they’d worked out what it was that was easily enough dealt with. This second building was a storage space of some kind, filled with crates and shelves of parts and pieces of something. The two of them did their best not to disturb any of it more than fighting monsters amongst it would force them to. 

Luckily the shelving was widely spaced, probably so that things could be pulled off the shelf by the lifter that sat derelict in the corner. This building was cleared much faster, being able to see all the monsters made it easy to draw them and engage from relative range. That war lance Nant was using did indeed have a ranged functionality. Those, it turned out, were not just weighty impact bolts, they had a mass reactive detonator. A few moments after they impacted a target they would explode. The effects of something having an explosion from right up against their hide, or inside them on the larger monsters was… Messy. Fujin wiped the ichor from one of the creatures from her eye after a particularly close blast.

“Sorry… um… probably should have just engaged that one…” Nant whispered from behind her as the second building started to look clear. The imps were high up and flighty, but magic was effective enough at grounding then crushing them. She took relish grounding them with a shaped Demi; tugging them into the concrete of the floor and dispatching them with a single thrust through their grotesque heads. 

“How long… um…” He paused as Fujin’s head turned to glare at him over her shoulder, flicking imp ichor off the tip of her blade. 

“Did you take to… um…” he said quailing a bit under her intense scrutiny, her eye narrowing slightly as his volume fell to a bare whisper and he mumbled out the last words. Her ears were still a little dull from the blast.

“WHAT?” she demanded and he nearly jumped. She imagined she might have been a bit louder than she intended. 

“I-I asked um, how long it, t-took you to, uh, learn to shape… paramagically, like you, um, with the I think it was demi? Like that’s um, really impressive…” he stammered through talking probably far louder than he needed to, wringing his hands around his lance and trying and failing to look her in the eye.

“FLIRTING?” She asked, raising an eyebrow as she started to stalk back to the outside, they hadn’t heard any new orders, but it was poor form to not check in with the leader.

“NO! I mean, not that you’re not pretty, or capable, I think you’re really pretty, and kinda scary, but like, not in a bad way, what I mean is it’s not a put off!” he started and the yawning silence of her staring back at him, shocked as much as he was at his bold phrasing. “Uh, I’m sure you could get any man you liked! Um, unless you like ladies, there’s nothing wrong with that either, I mean, I don’t mean to imply~” She raised a hand sharply that caused his mouth to close with an audible click. She gave him an amused glance. He was bright red, almost tomato-like in his embarrassment. She decided not to comment, as they walked out and he fell a few extra steps behind her mumbling to himself and holding his war lance like a life preserver.

Outside Karen was sitting staring out at the wall which had its fair share of holes in it, but no obvious monster activity. She popped up from the chunk of masonry she’d been sitting on. 

“All clear then? I knew you… what’s up with Nant?” she asked putting her hands on her hips and puffing out her chest before deflating a bit as the boy somehow managed to darken another shade. 

“Noth~” he barely started to get the word out when Fujin interrupted him with her usual force, cutting him off firmly.

“FLIRTED.” which got a laugh from Karen and led to Nant dropping his lance to one hand to cover his face with the other.

“I wasn’t…” he muttered as Karen started laughing.

“Oh man, did you let him down easy?” she asked eyes sparkling with mischief.

“DID NOT.” she pronounced walking away from the wall as she pulled out a smoke with her free hand lighting it with her ‘borrowed’ lighter. 

“Wait, you didn’t let him down easy or you didn’t tell him no?” Karen asked after spending a few long moments with her face scrunched up in consideration.

“DID NOT.” Fujin repeated with a slightly more playfully condescending tone as she walked out into the open space of the lot, away from them.

“Hey! I’m your squad lead and I demand you actually answer the question! Fujin!” Karen shouted following her nominal subordinate. 

Nant scurried after them with quite the concerned expression as Fujin let out a plume of smoke. 

“Use like, a whole sentence!” Karen demanded pointing accusingly at the other woman.

“He said he wasn’t flirting.” She said as though that explained everything, Karen rounded on Nant who immediately started looking for any escape.

“So, like, wait…” Karen said looking between Fujin and Nant who absolutely could not find his voice at all and merely walked away toward where any monster would have to pass to get into the compound through the largest hole in the wall. 

Fujin smirked around her smoke watching the wall and the shapes moving in the shadows of some of the surrounding buildings beyond. Their section had gone fairly quickly. Only minor injuries for anyone and they were quickly patched up with what supplies they had with them. 

Karen huffed after Fujin didn’t explain herself and just satisfied herself with looking between Nant and Fujin. The former resolute in not looking over at Fujin. The latter carelessly watching both her teammates. 

Karen decided that it wasn’t a fight that she could fight right now, It had already been three hours clearing out the buildings and the courtyard. She had left a swathe of monster bodies, nothing too extreme. Most of the biggest monsters had been in the yard and judging by the noise in the outlying buildings there had been a fair few monsters stalking them. 

Fujin’s stance was relaxed. Standing in the open where she had a fairly commanding view of the fences. If this was how difficult the SeeD examination was going to be, she was unconcerned. Now to wait out a hopefully quiet evening.  
\----------------

Never tempt the wrath of Hyne. Night had fallen and with it came a veritable swarm. The silence of the night was shattered by a whirlwind of howls as monsters crawled from their burrows and nests and began freely roaming for food. Nant and Fujin held close to Karen as they held against the tide at the walls. 

Fujin’s magical reserves had taken a severe hit as the tide swelled and she was focusing on draw casting. Much more difficult to shape draw cast magic, but it was far faster than attempting to draw and be efficient. It didn’t help that there were so many of them. She had dropped two magazines worth of triggers already and still they came. 

The whole squad was bleeding by this point. Nant had run dry on his bandolier of bolts not an hour after dark, She had had to begin choosing her triggers with great care. Basic potions had run dry as the tide rose, then restorative magic stocks had started to falter. Now Fujin was stuck draw casting them too. She was bleeding from a dozen minor wounds and only restorative magic was keeping her on her feet at all, she was sure. SeeD endurance was massive. They could run for miles without break, leap five meters off the ground from a standing start, however eventually even they began to flag. 

Nant had shown his fatigue first having to pull in closer to Karen and herself, his swings started to lack power, his stance quaked and he was huffing harshly brushing sweat and matted hair from his face with his shoulder nearly once a minute. Fujin herself was breathing hard. She had tested the edges of her endurance before in her life abroad, she could still fight. Though as she looked on to the darkness beyond the fences at the shifting shadowy creatures she wondered if it would be enough. Karen was nearly doubled over. Her fighting style had no force multiplier, no length to greaten her impacts so she was working on pure muscle. She was tough, Fujin could give her that. 

“Alright! Alright! Supply check! What are we working with?” Karen gasped in a lull in the fighting. The sounds of conflict flaring up and burning behind them elsewhere in the facility. Their corner had managed to hold its own for now. The worst had been a gang of the metallic giants. They were feeling the wear of warfare. 

“Ammo’s dry…” Nant gasped, tapping his pockets and bandolier weakly.

“Have, uh, one potion left… and… and a remedy. That’s everything…” he said slowly his breath coming in deep and clearly trying to keep it slow.

“My pockets are turned out, fuck!” Karen said, literally turning one of her pockets out for show. Fujin tapped her uniform.

“TABS.” she pulled a handful of small wrapped containers from her pocket.

“Looks like something might be… getting… brave…. SHIT!” Karen declared diving backward as an enormous shadow swooped into the courtyard. An enormous bat winged monstrosity with a comically huge jaw, wicked looking gleaming stinger and frankly freakishly large hands. It winged toward the storage house prompting Karen to lift their team’s short range radio which she had secured to the back of her belt. It was a bulky long duration battery with a heavy duty transceiver. 

“Elenoyle spotted on Team 3 location! Warehouse rooftop!” she shouted as the rain of magic began. It would point with its horrible claws and scouring black beams would leap out like searchlights. Nant was so confused by the appearance that Fujin had to physically throw him out of the way of the first one.

“DEATH!” she barked sharply as Nant scrambled to his feet. 

“What!?” He squeaked as Karen started to close toward the monster, Fujin not too far behind. Karen shouted over the din as a shape disconnected from one of the other battles and started leaping toward their corner of the manufacturing plant. 

“If that beam hits you it’ll literally kill you!” Karen declared, Nanty scrambled after them.

“WHAT!? How doe~” Nant’s complaint was cut off as the Elenoyle opened its grotesque mouth and a terrible lightning-laced wind poured out throwing all three cadets through the air and away from the monster that immediately raised a clawed finger again.

“SCATTER!” Fujin shouted, Karen and Nant both leapt to get behind some kind of cover as the spell swept after Karen this time. Fujin however, reached into its magic to look for a weapon and found something shocking. Well… She didn’t generally consider herself the greedy type. This was different though and she held her cover to grasp at threads, seconds ticking by as she gorged on a very rare and particular spell; her face alight.

The fourth person dropped into the field and raised a hand firing the self-same black beam back at the Elenoyle who swerved out of the way lightning fast. However where the beam touched it for only an instant the flesh started to turn pallid and discolored as though dead and bleached by an unseen sun. 

“If you possess Death, it isn’t immune to its own trick!” The SeeD declared. He wielded a bo staff and picked his way forward with great leaps from cover to cover advancing on the creature.

The monster responded much as it did last time, opening its hideous gob and throwing a literal whirlwind from it’s chest like an actual storm raged in its lungs blowing the SeeD back. Meanwhile Fujin had filled her thread into a thick chord and drew one last thread to place in herself. 

As the three of them slowly picked forward throwing lightning, fire and in the SeeD’s case the best option, Aeros at its wings and body. It absorbed the pain without much issue. Fujin however had a different trick. The magics she was attempting to twist together then really didn’t appreciate the union as the double throbbed in her soul and it rebelled, burning her hands and her very soul with the fury of their meeting. She stood up, braced herself and thrust one fist forward giving an outlet to the emulsion of terrible force she’d created. A ball of energy gathered in front of her closed fist. Even as the Elenoyle tilted its head to consider the strange phenomena before it, the throbbing ball of energy exploded into a thick pillar of power which struck it from throat to thorax. 

The throbbing pink and black beam seemed to stretch the edges of the monster twisting its body even as it disintegrated layer by layer as though flayed in fast forward, it tried to roar but it just came out a death rattle as the chunks of elenoyle that were outside the fantastic outpouring of energy fell to the ground severed so cleanly there was a neat cross section of red hot glowing material that began to smolder and crystalize. There was a collective hush in the moments after the spell’s light faded and the smell of ozone mixed with carbonization wafted through the air that left the burnt copper flavor of heavy metal on the rear of the mouth..

“What the fuck was that, cadet!? Death itself only has a maybe one in ten of killing that damned thing, that looked like Meltdown, but that doesn't atomize what you hit with it!” the Seed asked rounding toward Fujin and taking a more sedate jog back toward her a puzzled and mildly angry expression buzzing about his face.

“ADMIXTURE.” That answer brought the SeeD up short.

“What the fuck is... you know what I don’t have time to deal with this, whatever you did, if you see another one of those, do it again.” he said as he took a moment to gather himself and headed back into the battle on another front.

\--------

The night got a little quieter after the Elenoyle experienced atomization. The Elenoyle itself had frightened away a few monsters and the rather unsettling scent of its corpse and the remains of its disintegration gave them some breathing room. The monsters heading in were more of the small and skittery variety than the larger creatures. Fujin couldn’t help but be proud of herself though she kept it from her face.

Hour nine brought another wave of monsters. It coincided perfectly with the rumblings of the facility itself. As the systems slowly came back online it attracted fresh attention and a third wave of battle rushed on the cadets. At least this time, the SeeD working inside had warned them it was going to happen. They were pretty badly beaten up as it went, however all three were buzzing ready. Fujin had distributed her little tabs, she’d neglected to explain what they were really, but all three of them were positively vibrating with unspent energy now. The exhaustion pushed aside and only an eagerness to have something to do remained. 

The battle was a ready relief from the buildup. Karen especially had literally and figuratively leapt into the fray at the first thing that had dared step foot inside the perimeter defenses as power was briefly enabled. Fujin got a private laugh out of watching the two cadets ride the tabs out over the next few hours. Karen’s chatter returned non-stop any time they were not fighting something she was sharing probably unwise amounts of details of her personal life and experiences. 

Something Fujin found interesting and Nant seemingly found both fascinating and mortifying. Nant seemed to maintain his quiet, becoming instead a fountain of facial expressions and reactions. laughter, and various non-verbal sounds were remarkably easy to get out of him. Fujin, who’d been an off and on user of these for years handled the rush with practiced ease. Though she couldn’t help but pace like a caged animal herself. There was little relief available as they had to be ready to run up and down the wall at the drop of a hat. 

Soon enough though Karen’s questioning zoomed in on Fujin and she knew that it would be an exercise in frustration for everyone involved if she didn’t answer. 

“Why do you talk like that, anyway? Did you get your throat slit or something, or are you just trying to be mysterious? What is it with all that?” The woman asked needlessly invading Fujin’s personal space in the process.

“EFFICIENT.” She said carefully leaning back from the invasion, glaring down Karen’s enthusiasm to absolutely no effect. The woman firmly prodded her in the chest.

“Bullshit, efficient? That’s bullshit.” Karen declared throwing her fiercest scowl at Fujin who ignored it with ease.

“TRUTH.” She insisted. Karen scoffed and backed off a step, still too close for Fujin’s comfort. 

“Just seems to me like some kind of stupid purity test ‘can you put up with this?’ nonsense. You just don’t know how to talk to people so you hide behind some weird way of talking that nobody can understand.” Karen declared, crossing her arms. 

“I can understand her…” Nant says quietly, only to be completely ignored by Karen who drives on headlong.

“UNDERSTAND.” Fujin snarked, raising one eyebrow at the accusation.

“Well… that’s because he’s got a crush on you… and I’m really smart about these kinds of things! Do you know how confusing it is? Detail is important, especially if you’re going to get a relationship going. Nobody is going to want to deal with that every day, all day! Can you even talk like a normal person!?” Fujin snorted, unable to contain her amusement at Karen’s accusation.

“Um… Karen, she was talking earlier, like a complete sentence and everything…” Nant said even quieter than last time after being ignored. Fujin pointed at him without adding a word.

“No she didn’t!” Karen shouted, and Nant flinched.

“um... “ was all he could manage, thoroughly cowed.

“UNIMPORTANT.” Fujin said smoothly.

“Hey! This is important! What if it’s really important to give details and she tries to play, like, twenty statements with the information because she’s being weird!” Karen insisted seeing she was losing this argument rather rapidly.

“WOULDN’T.” She said easily.

“I bet you would, you’ve got this whole reputation as some badass black sheep going with half the students. And like, I don’t understand what you did to that Elenoyle, but you’re just one of us, born and raised.” Karen said, turning her back on Fujin, and in her eye as good as conceding defeat.

“WHATEVER.” Fujin said with a sigh and a theatrical shrug.

“Ahh! And stop trying to seduce the Commander! I’ve seen the way you’ve been looking at him!” Karen said nearly leaping as she spun to point a finger at Fujin who stared at her incredulously.

“WHAT.” Was all Fujin could manage, Karen huffed and marched a few steps away.

“You know what I’m talking about.” Was all the answer she got leaving Fujin gobsmacked. 

“NO.” was the most cogent response Fujin could manage. Nant snorted quite loudly.

“Um.. guys, the mission?” he said and three heads turned toward the relief of a monster scuttling into the yard speculatively heading toward the outlying buildings. The relief was immediate as the adrenaline.

\----------

Hour fourteen was quiet again as the SeeD lead repairs of the building defenses according to communications with the Estharian command. Bringing perimeter defenses up online was the only thing standing in their way of making the push to Estharian lines proper. It was slow going, clearing monster spoor and corpses then scavenging and building back up degraded systems not to mention things damaged in the fighting. The monsters slackened as dawn approached, each wave that did appear hit them a little harder. The hardest part of it was the mission progress was outside the cadet’s hands now and they could take time to eat and drink, stealing moments to head to their gear stashes and refit were welcome. Getting food and water, ammunition and supplies was a good thing to take the mind off of the endless hurry up and wait of the holdout defense. 

Logistics were the lifeblood of an operation like this and though they were cut off they also had most of what they needed. Thankfully Ragnarok was needed to make one more run through with parts needed for repair and managed to leave them a few odds and ends to ensure the mission had everything it needed. Being out in the cold before Fujin had, it seems, fairly overprepared, her bag was overpacked with ammunition, and supplies. To the point that when Karen and Nant changed their clothes out leaving her as the only one still wearing her ichor stained uniform like a badge. 

They’d asked her if she was going to get changed and she’d looked at them like they had two heads. It had taken a little prompting before she admitted that she had no spare clothes, used the space in her bags instead for contingency supplies. Like the tabs that had kept them as the only team that didn’t have at least one member asleep right that moment. The jitters had passed and now they were just awake, restless, and alert. They’d asked her where she’d gotten them and what they were and the only answer they’d gotten was Deling and a puff of smoke blown at them. They had decided that was all they were going to get out of her. They resolved to ask around later, out of sight of the keen senses of the cyclops.

\------

Halfway through hour twenty two Karen had crashed and fallen asleep practically standing. Nant thought it was funny until he nearly fell over himself about an hour later. Fujin weathered the come down well enough but ended up sitting on top of a ground car because the bone tiredness of the last full day of on and off combat with the sudden absence of the drug. Misery could barely describe the feeling.

It wouldn’t do for all three of them to pass out so she lit another smoke in celebration of being the last one awake and hoped that nothing bigger than a geezard would decide to test them. For the first two hours she was lucky. Fighting while completely exhausted is never a fun thing. But she made it though with only one brush with a career ending injury. 

Somewhere in hour twenty seven the power came on, stayed on, and the bubble visibly snapped into place shimmering out of the air and solidifying. The funny thing about the perimeter shield is it was Intended to keep a potential explosion inside the compound rather than actually prevent anything coming out, Ironic. As such the control was outside the shield and would need to be defended while the rest of the mission pushed to the Estharian highway and cleared a path along it. 

When Nant and Karen were both roughly toed in the ribs rousing them with moans of protest and getting them to their feet the SeeD were gathering the cadets for that push. The two members of Squad three who had been allowed to sleep were not refreshed but at least no longer dead on their feet. They had staggered to their packs, shoved the first thing they could put their hands around that was remotely edible in their mouths and drained entire canisters of water before regaining the wherewithal to take a look at Fujin. 

If they looked rough, uniforms askew and lightly stained by their fights and less than ideal sleeping conditions, she looked like death had flayed her alive and was currently wearing her skin. Her response to them asking if she’d managed to sleep was just a shrug and pulling another tab from her pocket to pop into her mouth. They looked at her shocked, then at each other. Neither could think of anything to say about that and set their eyes on the route to the highway where things were apparently fixing to get moving again. A runner from another team looking about as haggard as they felt informed them to move over to the Highway, with any gear they think they might need to walk the skyway and clear it out.

Team 3 gathered their bags and though they contained a lot less than when it had all started they were still quite heavy to tired bodies. Dragging themselves over to the highway entrance that would have brought the production of this facility to the center of the city years past, now it visibly was filled with overturned cars, lifters, and monsters as they shuffled or squawked in the distance. Up at the head of the group of eleven cadets, Nida was waiting looking back and forth. He had gained a long wound going from his hairline down to his eyebrow, lending him a fierce, no-nonsense appearance.

“Alright, Cadets! Supply check, then we start moving, hope you all caught an hour or two, it’s all the sleep you’re getting until it’s over!” there was a soft collective sigh of resignation repeated throughout the collection, even shared visibly by one of the SeeD at the front. 

“Our missions have only gotten more trying, more difficult as there have been less of us. Our standards have not fallen an inch, however. We only want the best, the most qualified. Sometimes that means being strong, sometimes smart, sometimes careful, but today it means marching about sixty kilometers along a highway and clearing the way for a military convoy. It gets elevated after about seven kloms. Then the going should be swift. That said, we’ve lost one cadet. Everyone, Parl Tesosa has fallen, doing his duty to protect his team.” Nida said and then bowed his head. 

There was nearly perfect silence for a few moments but for a few quiet sniffs, only one person’s private pain broke free in a sob during the silence. Nida raised his head, and looked across the assembled, his once soft gaze hardened by his life.

“Those that make it stand a chance of being SeeD. If you die, you will be remembered. Heh…” he stifled a laugh. One of the other SeeD gave him a warning look that he shrugged off.

“Original estimates suggested this job would need sixteen cadets and five SeeD, well, we didn’t have that many and decided to do it anyway. So I hope all of you are ready to be one and a half for another few hours.” He said with a grim smirk. He turned toward the distant rise of the skyway and unconsciously massaged the flesh on the inside of his elbow. 

“Alright, let’s do this. If I die I owe Tilmett three thousand Gil, that’s my drink budget for the week, so lets get a move on.” Nida joked as the SeeD fanned out one of them attaching to each team. Nida himself filling into the team of two. “Team One, you’re on guard duty, Sheena keep them sharp.” he said motioning to one of the full three man teams who broke off to head to the rather fortified tower that housed the shield controls. A look of relief on that team’s face as they parted throwing one last glance at their fellows. Then Nida began the march.

“Weapons live, time to earn our pay again.” He said and started walking toward the highway casually pushing vehicles off the road to block alleys, the other SeeD and cadets doing the same.

With this many of them the walk was almost sedate.

\------------

Turns out walking gets hard after hour five. Fujin hadn’t done more than contribute precise spellfire to the last five skirmishes, turns out many hands make light work. Concentrated firepower brought down a second Elenoyle without Fujin having to do something absurdly dangerous twice in… well, twice in as many days at this point. 

Drinks and food were shared as shifts were taken clearing the roadway, pushing vehicles over the edge as they rose above the housing blocks and miscellaneous buildings. Only the occasional flying creature tried its luck, usually quickly dissuaded by spellfire. Above the sprawl of the city the SeeD with the communications pack was in discussion with the Estharian military. The long walk was mostly removing vehicles and clearing overrun fallbacks. 

It gave one time to think. Fujin’s mind was buzzing again, there was the energy in her heart, fluttering away, but her limbs were like lead and her hands were shaking. Her skull was pounding with the pressure of keeping her eye open and her breathing steady. She was remembering why she didn’t usually stack tabs like this, just wasn’t a good plan. Her grip was firm and her mind clear enough to grasp the fragile strands of magic at her command even if she didn’t have the acuity for real shaping feats at the moment, that would have to be enough. 

Her teammates had been glancing at her constantly. While academically she could read worry on their faces, her pride was abraded by the attention. She’d been in worse situations than surrounded by sure allies making a push through minimal monsters toward friendly lines. She held herself up straight, keeping her ramrod posture as best she could, though she had to lean her gunblade on her shoulder because it was starting to feel heavy all on its own. That was a bad sign but hopefully this was nearly the end of the mission. Thirty three hours is a very long time to be awake and working.

The fighting really only resumed as they approached the actual hold line where the more aggressive, intelligent, or misanthropic monsters pressured the Estharian army regulars. Once they were only a few kilometers out the Garden detachment gathered its supplies, made sure everyone had a chance to ready themselves, check their weapons, and clean their faces. Water and a few clean-ish rags got passed around, then they made the final push. It was a tour de force, naturally. SeeD could be compared to a common soldier only in technicality. Estharian Terminators could put up a fight, but it was a bullet against a tank. Monsters that took serious fighting to take down were like wheat. 

There was a cheer from the Estharian lines as they broke through. There was a waiting convoy that immediately geared up their engines and started rolling as the Garden party got out of the path. A few of the cadets were already celebrating, jumping and cheering as the armored vehicles rolled along the now cleared bridge carrying supplies and kit for creating a new bastion at the factories. 

The group of them formed up into a rough formation as Nida and the other SeeD spoke to a man in a fancier uniform than most of the troopers on the lines. The conversation lasted about half an hour before the SeeD came back and said the magic words.

“Cadets! Mission Accomplished.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember kids, if a stranger you barely know offers you free drugs, you say thank you, drugs are expensive.
> 
> I hope you all enjoyed, my terrible jokes aside. Please consider leaving a comment to tell me what I did wrong, or alternatively what I did right. Thank you for your time.


	7. Sendoff

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Return, the Celebration. The preparations, a change of pace.

The ride home on the Ragnarok was staggeringly loud, even with a body on board the solemnity had vanished with the explosive power of expectation. The SeeD were keeping to themselves talking and reviewing what had happened not really speaking to anyone. The cadets were in chaos, sharing their experiences and comparing to those they knew and even enthusiastic strangers.

Fujin sat, unlit smoke in her lips, twiddling with the lighter, knowing that smoking in an enclosed ship was at best, impolite. Watching the energy and letting it wash over her she felt like a stone in the tide. She was happy enough with her performance, but the drugs were wearing off and she’d already nodded off and woken up four times.

Finding herself nestled into an alcove to protect her as she faded in and out. Too much noise and motion to sleep more than fitfully. Her dreams, where they rose up, a jumbled mix of exaltation and awful terror.

Once she wore up, still in the Ragnarok to something blocking the light, only to find Nida standing over her, hands casually in his pockets.

“I wondered where you’d gone. Danna thought you had deserted in Esthar.” he said with a tone of dismissal. She looked up at him blearily, blinking away some of the sleep and shifting, only to wince as the stiffness of her awkward position caught up with her.

“Yeah, that seems about right.” Nida huffed a small bit of laughter.

“I heard from your squad you took some kind of stim and gave it to them as well to keep up the corner. Good initiative. Wanted to commend you.” he said softly. Fujin stared at his face placing him, their past if any.

“KNEE?” she asked softly and he let out a sharp bark of laughter after a moment’s consideration.

“Healed up fine. But you really didn’t have to kick so hard…. That was years ago, surprised you remembered.” he said rubbing his chin looking away from her. She continued blearily looking up at him.

“Well you’re probably hella hung over. I’ll let you sleep on it. Don’t worry won’t leave you sleeping on the ship while everyone else gets to party.” Nida said, waving a hand at her as he walked away. She considered this strange moment of human connection with all her available brain power then, deciding it didn’t mean much, leaned back against the bulkhead and let her eye slam closed. She was softly snoring in seconds.

\--------------

She stood outside Squall’s office, her hair a mess, still matted with sweat, uniform badly stained and torn, her eye heavy and unable to remember more than snippets after Nida’s little monologue that he so rudely woke her up to witness. She looked down at the papers in her hands, SeeD graduations. She carefully opened it as she started walking slowly, near to the walls of the second floor hallways.

Other people were cheering, one person was crying openly. Exhaustion could do funny things to people. Her feet carried her into the elevator and down to the main floor where she started making her way back to her dorm. People seemed to get out of her way, possibly due to her appearance, possibly due to the smell, possibly due to the person following her, she wasn’t completely sure.

Conduct, first portion, fifty points. She huffed, reading the notes attached to the score, taciturn and uncommunicative!? Bullshit, she was a perfect communicator. They literally had a discussion about it in the field. Fine, so she disliked small talk, and these people weren't her friends. She wasn’t obligated to let them in just because they shared a team. Her eye glided down past the insulting score.

Judgement was second, one hundred points. perfect marks. Her frown flowed into a smirk and a smug one at that. She glanced at the notes, use of service-extending materials to ensure the team remained effective through trial. Nida had done as he said then. A man as good as his word was worth well enough. She considered some of the smaller critiques more neutrally. Obeying superiors, spillover from conduct. She did as she was told during the exam. The rules existed to keep those who follow them secure and blameless… or rather, the spirit behind them more than their letter unless authority was watching.

She wondered about that not being part of conduct and reread the conduct notes. Ultimately it wasn’t her place to tell them how to write the rules, but these section headings were a little misleading. She hummed as she walked, still reading.

Attack, what a strange name for the section, she assumed it must be legacy, the current administration is usually not so vague. Oh, it was a measure of combat effectiveness, one hundred ten points. She paused walking to scratch her head and read the notes. Oh, her use of admixture against the Elnoyle had earned her bonus points and a citation to forward information on the technique. She would message Selphie later, and figured that the left hand didn’t know what the right was doing.

She resumed walking, and whoever was behind her started walking as well. Spirit was next, full marks, one hundred points with no shock. Retreat during this mission would have been fairly disastrous. Keeping knuckle down was essential.

Attitude. Really? She let out a bark of laughter, a hand dropping to her hips and she couldn’t help but shake her head before she could even think of reading this. She’d write a letter. This scoring system is ridiculous. Seventy points. Too much unnecessary conversation that was not mission related. She let out a short growl. It figured her score would be dragged down by someone who didn’t even graduate the exam. The thought brought back her smile. Vengeance was a dish best served second hand.

SeeD Rank: 6. Well, better than one.

Folding the paper she turned her head to see who it was that had been following her across half the garden. Oh, well that would explain why nobody had gotten in her way. Squall stood, hands by his sides looking distinctly unimpressed.

“SQUALL.” she said rather limply.

“You almost fell over when I handed you your graduation review.” He said and she considered this information, yes, she supposed that was the case.

“TIRED.” she settled on as a summation.

He smirked and huffed amusement, a smirk climbing up the corner of his mouth for a moment as he looked away. He brought his eyes back up to hers and spoke evenly.

“You walked away before I could inform you, due to the rigors of the exam the graduation formal is put off until tomorrow night.” He said and she mulled over in her mind the pros and cons of showing up at all.

“GOING?” she asked, lucid enough for a brief conversation, might as well get some information.

“Current and former SeeD will be present.” He illuminated, well that kept it simple. If she survived this psychotic plan of Squall’s then these would be the people she worked with. She supposed that she would have to show up, for appearances sake at least.

“SLEEP.” she said, and he nodded.

“I’ll make sure someone wakes you up before the party.” he said with a chuckle and she narrowed her eye at him. He turned on his heel and raised a hand in parting. She had no recourse but to turn and leave as well, nearly dragging her feet to the dorms. She didn’t even have the wherewithal to do more than strip out of her clothes and flop down on top of her bed before she was out like a light.

\-------------

She was awakened by a pounding at her door and far too much enthusiasm in the voice through the door with her mundane task to be anyone but Tilmett. She staggered to her door and slammed the button to open it, her most vicious glare all lined up. Opening the door to find the petite woman in full dress uniform, her smile blinding was somehow unexpected.

“ ‘Afternoon, Sleepyhead!” Selphie says rocking back and forth, toes to heels, with her hands behind her back. Then Selphie’s eyes roamed downward.

“You look like naked hell!” she said with far too much positivity.

Fujin paused and looked down at herself only to find that, yes, the tiny terror was correct. With a slowly unclouding mind she slammed the door closed button without a word before her rising flush could actually kill her with embarrassment. She had literally, less than 48 hours ago, pledged she would not flash anyone unless she meant to, and yet. Here she landed. She walked back through the room sniffing at the clothes strewn about to find something mildly clean until it dawned upon her that the dirtiest thing in the room was probably her. Her next move was taking her bathing robe and towel, pausing to grab her toiletries and re-opening the door to find Selphie still standing outside.

“Good plan, hot stuff!” she said, giving two thumbs up, winking, and clicking her tongue.

“AWAKE.” Fujin said firmly to the shorter woman.

“Yup, sure are.” Selphie said falling in behind Fujin as she walked to the showers, Selphie only stopped just inside the warm humid space of the showers hovering in the doorway.

“FOLLOWING.” Fujin said sternly as she stepped into a stall, pulled off her robe and set aside her towel. She put the water on a little hotter than she normally would and set to scrubbing herself pink.

“Yep! So, has anybody ever told you that you are, like, the height of a hardbody? Because damn girl.” Selphie said cheerily, drawing an audible groan from Fujin.

“Aw, don’t be like that, if it makes you feel better I’ll show you mine?” Selphie offered warmly.

“NO.” Fujin grunted, glad that the shower stall hid her embarrassment at the offer.

“Okay.” Selphie said, and started humming a little tune that Fujin didn’t recognize.

“SENT?” Fujin asked a few minutes later, after she’d cleaned her hair and face. At this point thoroughly resigned to the woman’s presence.

“Yeah! Squall asked me to make sure you were awake.” Selphie said to which Fujin grunted. It took far longer than she felt a shower should, however, Fujin emerged thoroughly cleaned down to the teeth and found Selphie standing in the doorway out to the hallway.

“AWAKE.” Fujin said sharply, Selphie brushed off the frustration like summer mist.

“Sure, but I’d be a pretty bad friend if I just left you on a big day like this! You made it! SeeD! That’s a big deal, Fujin!” Selphie said skipping forward a step to beam another smile at her. Fujin remained unimpressed, which only momentarily dulled Selphie’s shine.

“Don’t look at me like that. Just because we were on opposite sides once doesn’t mean we can’t be on the same side now. Besides, you are about to be the only backup for one of my favorite people in the world. I care about him, and I trust his judgement. He’s sure about you, so I’m sure about you. You’re good people.” Selphie said, stopping Fujin with the fingers of one hand on the taller woman’s stomach, looking her in the eye unflinching, her face uncharacteristically grave.

Fujin’s mouth pulled into a small line as the eye contact remained. Selphie seemed to be waiting for something. Some acknowledgement, but Fujin could only stand there, unsure what to say at all. She only had one person she really cared about in the world. And in the end he had chosen fishing over her. She’d chosen the path of blood, time and time again and walked it alone. Looking the smaller woman in the eye she saw a great deal churning in the open windows of Selphie’s eyes, determination, anger, certainty, and something softer as well.

“Do you get it? I know you’ve been out in the cold, but there are people that do care whether you live or die. Raijin does, we both know that.” Fujin’s face pulled deeper into a fierce frown, but her throat tightened when she tried to speak. Unsure where the smaller woman was going and disconcerting eager to hear it said out loud.

“But it seems like Squall does too. I don’t know what you did to make it happen. But good job, anybody who can pull him out of his problems for even a minute is a friend of mine. Whether you like it or not.” Selphie’s voice was quiet, her tone forceful, teetering on the promise of violence. Fujin felt the pressure of the smaller woman’s hand increase, her fingers tensing in the fabric of the robe, like she was planning to grab a handful. Fujin’s heartbeat had been steadily rising.

“WHY.” Fujin finally managed to cough out. She was embarrassed by the lapse in poise but Selphie just laughed, it was a restrained kind of laughter, keeping them quiet. Selphie’s face became a rueful smile.

“Because silly, I know what it feels like to be out in the cold surrounded by hostile people with nobody you can lean back on.” her face jumped back to seriousness at Fujin’s skeptical look.

“Shush! I know how people see me. I’m the happy one, always upbeat, never let anything get me down.” she said keeping their conversation quiet and intimate, it was doubtful anyone even as close as the hallway could hear the normally bubbly woman.

“And I think we both know how easy it is to put on a mask and pretend things don’t bother us.” Selphie says searchingly. Fujin rocked back, guilt gripping her brain. Her lips parted a moment only to slip back closed. Selphie took her silence as assent.

“You aren't alone. Not anymore.” Selphie held firm. Her hand slid around to Fujin’s side and her other hand came up to rest on the other side as Fujin’s eye widened slightly.

“I’m going to give you a hug.” Selphie declared authoritatively.

“Because you’re my friend and you need one.” She said and pulled Fujin in with a firm pressure. It was the most intimate thing anyone had done to her in a long time and she felt her blood rushing to her face as she awkwardly put her arms around the other woman, lacking firmness, lacking tenderness. Selphie’s hug tightened and she pressed her head into the taller woman’s collarbone.

Fujin felt hideously awkward, her brain racing with questions she didn’t have easy answers to. They stood like that, one firmly in the other’s arms as the questions piled up until Fujin’s heart was pounding and her skull pounded with things she didn’t want to think about, a vast door locked and barred in her mind stood bowing inward with the tremendous pressure of unwelcome things.

“Relax.” Fujin started as the soft voice tickled the skin of her neck, her ears sharper than razors.

“It’s okay to not know what to do, or say. You don’t have to say anything.” Selphie whispered, turning her head so her forehead was pressing into the soft material of the bathrobe.

“I think you understand, now. You don’t have to understand why, but people do care about you. Even if you don’t care back. I hope you will, eventually.” Selphie’s soft voice reverberated against the cooling, humid air of the showers. Fujin’s eye was squeezed shut. This only made the physical contact feel that much keener.

For only a moment Fujin’s grip tightened, fractionally, desperately before Selphie pulled back to arms length, pulling Fujin’s hands back to rest on her shoulders. The hand on her side left its place came up to her cheek, drawing a tiny shocked gasp from Fujin in the same instant a darting finger ran across her eye lashes, clearing the gathered moisture. It fluttered open in shock to see a beaming smile.

“Hi! So…” Selphie said, her eyes dropping down, taking in Fujin’s robed form slowly, almost indecently. Fujin’s flush refused to retreat as Selphie’s lips parted and Fujin braced herself for a question she absolutely didn’t want to hear.

“Where did you get this bathrobe it is, like, so soft!” Selphie said taking the material between two fingers and rubbing it. Fujin almost gagged on air, her mouth bursting open with a shocked bark of laughter.

“QUISTIS?” she sputtered, disbelieving the hard turn of the conversation.

“Oh yeah, she did say she’d gotten most of your clothes set up didn’t she…” Selphie said appreciatively, her hands dropping from Fujin’s body and one of them came up to her lips thoughtfully stroking them as she stepped out of Fujin’s path. The taller woman swiftly took long steps eager to escape the horribly awkward, deeply unsettling, unasked for heart to heart that none the less left her feeling strangely warm and light.

“Good talk! See you around!” Selphie said as Fujin passed. Fujin opened her mouth to say something as a hand struck her bottom with a resounding slap making her nearly jump out of her skin and shoot forward a few steps in sheer shock.

“Stay cute, Miss Hardbody!” Selphie said with a positively devilish smirk, a wink, and a click of the tongue. Fujin practically jogged away from the confusing little brunette, her face beet red which she wished she could blame on a hot shower. Her eye showing whites as her brain swirled with all the whiplash of their terrifyingly intimate conversation. All the same, as she made it back to her dorm and disrobed to put on her formal uniform she found herself with an unaccountable little smile all the same that she wiped from her face before anyone could see it. When she stepped in front of a mirror to make sure the uniform was sitting properly she couldn’t keep her eye from roving her figure and subtly flexing her muscles. The little smile coming back for only a moment.

\-------------

Sparkling wine was a rare treat. She had had it once before, while she had been playing bodyguard to a minor crime boss with delusions of importance. It hadn’t lasted long, he burned through his gil with an increasingly foolish lifestyle before his people abandoned him and took what they could. The wine was sharp and bitter to her with the memory of the idiot attempting to ply her into his bed. He had seriously underestimated the ability of a SeeD with a firm understanding of junction to resist the effects of alcohol. She was pulled from the memory as someone approached her drawing her from her own memories. Trepe, naturally, with a businesslike smile.

“Here you are, hiding in the corner?” Quistis teased lightly, Fujin opted for an unimpressed look and a slightly inclined head which Quistis waved off with a manicured hand.

“Don’t be too concerned, I’m not here to make trouble for you. In fact I wanted to thank you.” Quistis said, raising her own flute of sparkling wine.

“REASON?” Fujin asked holding her glass up in front of her face and her eye watching the twenty odd people in the room, many of them with obvious prosthetics.

“I was fairly certain Nant was going to only come home in a body bag.” She said flatly, her pretty face falling into a distant frown which snapped back to Fujin and softened.

“I understand you actually worked fairly closely with him throughout the exam?” She asked probingly. Fujin saw no harm in stating facts and nodded her assent.

“Ah. Good, I have high hopes for him on the next exam… Oh, by the way, he can’t hear your name without blushing. You really did make quite the impression upon him.” she said, stretching an arm out to tap her glass to Fujin’s bringing a slight ring to the musical atmosphere of the ballroom.

Fujin grimaced and looked away as Quistis brought a hand up to her mouth to muffle her laughter that she simply could not contain.

“It’s just a boyish crush, believe me, I deal with a lot of them. Then again, I think he might not be the only one.” Quistis said sipping her glass delicately and stepping a little bit back as Nida walked up, the scar on his forehead really adding some gravity to his boyish face.

“Fujin, I’d been hoping to find you. I wanted to talk to you…” he said looking at Quistis sidelong. Fujin turned her head to consider him directly and he looked thoughtful.

“May I have this dance?” he asked looking at Quistis as the older woman smirked at some private amusement. Fujin looked between the two of them and sighed. Thrusting the last bit of unpleasantly acidic wine into Quistis’ hand who took it without hesitation. Nida offered his hand bowing just a few degrees as Fujin took it and followed him out to gentle ballroom music. The tempo was fairly high letting them talk while moving. His footwork was good though hers was workmanlike at best, she could admit he had skill she didn’t at this. She watched his face though she couldn’t help but notice his hand on her side was really just his fingertips.

“I wanted to personally congratulate you now that you’re awake. I don’t know if you remember our little talk on the ship?” he began, his face blandly pleasant. She nodded slightly, most of her attention on not stepping on his feet.

“Ah good, I’m quite happy we have another paramagical expert in our ranks. I was quite impressed by the recordings of what I saw. You have real skill.” she took the compliment with a nonverbal sound of assent, he seemed bothered by it. They danced in silence, keeping step as the song slipped along, playing out the track as he built up to something.

“Have you been given a mission assignment yet?” He asked carefully. She focused on his face a moment, something about the way he asked drew her attention and she searched his eyes. Unexpectedly she found something somewhat familiar in them.

“...YES.” She said looking away from his eyes, as Nida nodded slightly, leading without interruption through the dance as they spoke. Another long pause as they twirled together.

“Ah, well…” he said visibly rallying himself. “When you make it back, would you like to get lunch some time?” He asked trying to be smooth, but the sentence picked up speed as he went. Fujin looked back into his eyes. Surprise written plainly on her face even though her lips remained closed.

“You don’t have to answer now.” he said delicately and she could feel him pull back slightly as the song came toward an end. She was saved from having to answer the question by a presence that smoothly appeared beside them. Squall Leonhart glanced back and forth between the two of them.

“May I cut in?” He asked neutrally as Nida let go of Fujin’s shoulder and side, stepping back with a bow. She turned to Squall and nodded. Nida stepped back looking mildly uncomfortable. Fujin stepped toward Squall as the next song picked up an only marginally slower song.

“He seems impressed with you.” Squall said, glancing at Nida’s retreat as they moved. Fujin could only look pensive at that statement. Squall flashed her a smirk. Not enjoying his implication she purposefully missed a step and forced him to awkwardly hop to avoid stepping on her feet. She flashed him a smirk and he nodded.

“MISSION?” she asked after giving him a moment to reorganize the dance to not be off beat again.

“In part. You’re closer to the ground and I’d like your advice on fitting in better with the… elements we’re going to be infiltrating. After the party would you be free to offer advice?” he asked seriously and she thought about it.

“YES.” it wasn’t too hard. Having him look like he did now would be a dead giveaway, he was too clean cut and unassuming to be taken seriously by anyone who didn’t already know who he was. He looked young still. She took a moment to really look at his face as they danced. Her eye traced the smooth lines of his face. He looked so unspoiled. Though his eyes seemed older by far. They carried the weight of judgement, and of responsibility.

She wondered idly what he saw when he looked at her, because she could see him inspecting her as she inspected him. The thought made her uncomfortable, what did he see? She forced down her fear. He had spared her life, he had had it at his mercy, he had done so much to ensure she was free and well. That introspective observation itself though brough uncomfortable feelings too.

“THINKING?” She finally blurted a little louder than she wanted.

\-------------------

Squall considered the question. Well, he couldn’t tell her he was impressed how well she returned to looking normal after yesterday. Not only was it kind of rude, it would be admitting a bit too much attention to her face. That did draw his attention back to her though. Looking at her was a reminder of what he had decided he would do. A decision that frightened him more and more as the time to execute on it got closer. To go out in the cold someone he barely knew to hunt enemies that were as vicious as they were dangerous.

He looked at the lines on her face, the faint scarring around the edges of her worn eye patch that peeked through her hair as they danced. The hardness of her skin. She had little fat in her face lending it a sharp countenance. It gave her an intense and firm expression. Her resting expression gave an air of displeasure, of disgust. They were of a height so he received the full effect. Looking into her eye though, softened her face some. There was a vibrancy, a concealed energy. Almost a nervousness, like a cornered mouse. It was easy to see the difficulty of her life on her face. She was younger than him. Every Garden student had a sharpness to them, military training will do that to anyone. It taught them all to be liars, scavengers, opportunists, and predators. Few enough of them had to apply all those lessons, Fujin was definitely one. He could feel it in her calloused hands and firm grip.

“You’ve had a very difficult hand dealt to you and I’m asking you to do it again.” He said suddenly, her eye widened. He realized with her short gasp she had been breathing very shallowly, the tension he hadn’t been noticing sprung and she pulled back from him. Rather than let her go he held firm to her and continued the dance. She regained her poise nearly instantly if he had not had his hands on her he might not even have noticed her flinch. He knew however if he hadn’t held on she would have put distance between them.

“CAPABLE.” She said her voice was sharp, almost defensive. He shook his head just slightly.

“I doubt there are many in Garden who could have done what you’ve done.” he assured her quickly, his tone even. The music’s cadence held them in a kind of circle, smooth motion forcing quiet conversation and a minimum of disruption to avoid tangling into another couple. He gave her several seconds where she looked pensive but ultimately said nothing.

“There are fewer still I would trust enough to try this.” He added, he saw her throat work a moment, but her lips never budged. The eye contact made their conversation intense in a way he wasn’t expecting and when he paused to assess he realized his heart was pounding unaccountably. He took a deep slow breath with difficulty. Fujin took this as pretence and directed them off the dance floor even though the song was still going.

Breaking the eye contact and the close contact left him feeling relieved. He had said his peace and asked his question. The two of them decided more or less at the same time to get something to eat and drink. It wasn’t too deep in the night yet for the lay to have all hit room temperature.

As he greedily drank a cup of punch he watched Fujin jam an entire hors d’oeuvre into her mouth and chew it only with difficulty, swallowing the lump with the aid of wine. He almost laughed, before turning around to find a blonde head of hair nearly in his face.

“Quistis.” he inclined his head slightly as she set both empty champagne flutes on the table.

“Quite the intense conversation, commander.” she said with that devilish little smile that told him she had gotten some idea he would disapprove of.

“Talking about our upcoming mission.” he said, honestly enough. She made some small sound he couldn’t place and when he looked back at her he would characterize her face as suspicious. He dismissed her by picking up a small sandwich and taking a bite of it, one hand under it to catch the inevitable crumbs of the dry bread. He was pleased when there weren't any and the bread wasn’t dry. Better than last time at least. He heard Quistis’ heels click on the floor as she stepped closer.

“Squall. Are you sure you should be the one to go?” she asked quietly. He detected just a touch of real fear hiding behind the question, turning to her he didn’t let his own nerves betray him on his face.

“Who else?” he asked, she opened her mouth and he continued, cutting her off on purpose.

“Who would trust her, who could? Who could we trust to see it through? Who could stand toe to toe with what is likely to be organized rogue SeeD agents? Do you think you can? Selphie? Irvine abandoned Junction after the war. Xu?” Squall asked evenly, Quistis’s cheeks puffed out in frustration, her eyebrows pulled together indignantly.

“It feels like everything’s balanced on a knife edge, Leonhart! We need you here.” she said pleadingly almost. She tried very hard to make it sound like a statement, but he could hear the bitterness.

“Trepe. If I didn’t believe in you all, I wouldn’t be willing to even try.” he turned to face her fully leaning in to look her hard in the eye.

“I just sign paperwork, I’m a figurehead at this point for most intents and purposes, and someone else can do that. We rebuilt this Garden, not me.” he said refilling his punch.

“I don’t have to like it.” Quistis said after a long moment.

“No, but I appreciate you care enough to challenge me.” Squall said, giving her a small smile that she returned with a sigh.

“... well then the least you can do is give me this dance.” she said teasingly, one sculpted eyebrow quirking up to match her smirk.

“Fine.” he offered out a hand genuinely and took her to the dance floor.

\--------------

Fujin hovered near the table, listening to Trepe and Squall argue. She felt mildly guilty about eavesdropping, but it ultimately concerned her too. She was so caught up in watching the two SeeD saunter out onto the dance floor that she nearly jumped out of her skin when a hand tapped her on the shoulder. She spun, already chambering a punch for where she guessed their face would be only to be surprised when the target was familiar and much shorter than expected.

“Woah! Hi! Don’t punch! Just Selphie, hello!” The small figure held up her hands palm out defensively looking almost out of place in her dress uniform.

Fujin blinked, and looked around a moment.

“HELLO?” she asked, and Selphie smiled bouncing forward a step.

“Just wanted to come over and say congratulations and good luck! Also, I forwarded you your first month’s salary in case you need some last minute supplies!” The bubbly brunette bounced a step past Fujin to snatch some morsel of cheese and pop it in her mouth.

Fujin nodded seriously. That was a good thing, she had been literally gil-less after spending her last 10 gil coin on a cold coffee six days ago. She watched as Selphie danced on her feet a bit before coming to some decision about what to do next.

“Wanna dance?” the shorter woman asked and Fujin glanced out at the dance floor. She was very awake and feeling the effects of the fortified sparkling wine. It was stronger than the cheap stuff she had typically gotten when clean water was unavailable. She’d already had three glasses in her reluctance to actually mingle in any meaningful way until Trepe had come over to needle her.

“...” Before Fujin could open her mouth to give a definitive answer Selphie had shoved another piece of cheese in her mouth and taken Fujin’s hand dragging her onto the dance floor, a smile on her face.

“Don’t try to think of a reason to say no, we’re at a party!” she said quickly, taking Fujin’s hands and laying them where they needed to be for a close dance, barely space for daylight between them.

“IMPATIENT.” Fujin chastised glaring down at the other woman even as she allowed herself to be dragged along. Falling into step and having to take the lead as Selphie started talking.

“Pshaw, people keep telling me that, I just don’t have time for other people’s bullshit.” Selphie dismissed her out of hand, easily following her lead, speaking in cadence with their steps.

“There’s going to be some big changes soon, one way or the other.” She continued. Her fingers tracing small circles on Fujin’s side and shoulder. Restless hands with restless eyes and a restless mouth. It was tiring to be around the woman, but never boring.

“IMPORTANT.” Fujin decided to interrupt the monologue.

“I’m hoping everything comes together. But I’m also half expecting one of the teams to get shipped back as chunky style salsa, y’know?” she chuckled as Fujin looked concerned.

“It was a joke! And I definitely don’t think it’ll be you two…” she patted Fujin on the side, Fujin’s eyes narrowed.

“SLAPPED.” Her eyes narrowed glaring at Selphie.

“Oh, are you mad about that? But your heinie is so slappable, look at that thing, Mm!” Her hand slipped lower only to be arrested by Fujin promptly.

“CEASE.” She intoned firmly. Selphie gave a little shrug.

“Oh, come on, it’s all in good fun! I bet if you asked Squall he’d do it for you too.” She said smirking that devilish little smirk of hers. Fujin’s eye widened minutely.

“Shh, I won’t tell, I promise, SeeD’s honor!” briefly saluting before sending her hand back to its proscribed place.

“NOT.” Fujin said, darkening about the neck and collar. Selphie pulled them slightly closer together to whisper softly.

“He’s a real good guy, I knew Rinoa pretty well you know? She had nothing but praise.” Selphie said with a very deliberate wink. The flush crept up Fujin’s neck as her eye darted to the commander of garden talking with Quistis as they danced with remarkable grace speaking slowly.

“DESIST.” Fujin said her eye snapping back to Selphie whose grin had grown to proper Cheshire levels, Fujin almost expected feathers to appear in her teeth any moment.

“Your secret is safe with me.” Selphie winked dramatically.

“NOT!” Fujin hissed desperate to stop the little malicious imp from starting some ludicrous rumor.

“It’s not a secret? Oh, then I’m going to have a field day on my blog, It’s been years since anybody could thaw out our commander even a little. He was so, like, limp. Just passing through life, trying to make things better but the heart was dead? The last two weeks have been great for him, it’s like the first months after the war’s end!” Selphie said her volume kept low but her words spilled out in a torrent. Fujin’s face flushed right up to her cheeks at all this mortifying personal detail.

“SECRET!” Fujin hissed slapping a hand over Selphie’s mouth. Selphie tried to talk but Fujin just pressed the hand hader. When she felt something soft and wet touch her hand she jerked it away to rub on her skirt furiously.

“Your palms are sweaty.” Selphie declared.

“Fine, it is a secret.” She gave another very deliberate wink that drew a frustrated growl from Fujin.

“But seriously. If you need anything before you go, just ask, I’ve seen the reports you’ve been handling Admixture in the field, that’s really dope, I’ve got it pretty much down as well, even though I’m running out of double, but that’s neither here nor there...” She continued, and Fujin was happy to let her, now on a safer topic.

“Condoms?” Selphie asked getting another sputter out of Fujin.

“Kidding! Kidding. You’re too high strung, Fujin. But what do I know, maybe that’s part of the charm. I want you to come back alright, and bring Squall with you. Look out for each other okay?” Selphie said, dropping her playful demeanor to step out of the dance and crush Fujin with a hug for a moment.

“Be as safe as you can, and come back to us.” She said, her face pressed right over Fujin’s heart.

“WILL.” Fujin said patting the shorter woman on the top of the head looking around nervously to see who was paying attention to find that shocking nobody really was. Well it was Selphie, she was given to this kind of thing.

At least the song was ending…

\------------

Fujin and Squall were in his private bathroom, he was sitting on his toilet while she stood over him looking over him with a pair of electric clippers in her hand.

“Just do it.” he said and she shrugged turning them on and shearing the sides and back of his hair down almost to nothing, then she clipped on a guide and moved in on the top. Channeling the young toughs of Galbadia, the speed finks and the street knives. She was careful, but deliberate, leaving him with a stripe of hair up the center of his head only about an inch long. Contrast the scalp visible beneath the rest of his hair.

She ran her fingers along his scalp checking for evenness before pulling off the guide and lifting his head and brought up the buzzing clippers held steady.

“Woah, what are you doing?” he pulled his head back in protest. She sighed and drew two little lines on his eyebrow with her little finger.

“STYLE.” she explained and he slowly settled back down.

“Really? Hmph. Whatever, do it.” He said closing his eyes and she shaved two parallel lines in his eyebrow. She brushed off his bare shoulders of fallen hair and turned off the clippers, motioning at the mirror in the cramped space.

He stood up and looked at himself in the mirror running his fingers over the close shear.

“...wow.” he murmured. Fujin smiled and swung the clipper by the chord proud of her work. Nothing too complicated. But she privately did think he looked quite striking with that cut and the facial scar. She flipped the clippers up into her hand and set it down on the sink. She’d gotten her hair cut earlier. More of a pixie cut than anything. Asymmetric, undercut on the right, to let it fall to cover her left side partially, falling over the patch. Kept her eye line clean and stylish to boot. She’d had it done when they went looking for clothes and eventually she’d found what she was looking for style-wise.

Tactical webbing or pockets were a must for them, shells and magazines needed them to hide in or belts to keep them handy, so what he’d helped her pick out for him had favored a build around pockets, which he felt more confident with while she favored webbing. Black leather with a cloth hood for the jacket, sleeveless solid colors beneath high neck. They both tended toward reinforced pants so motorcycle jeans had been the order of the day, luckily they hadn’t needed to do any modification to the materials available, Balamb’s quartermaster was a quick worker with a priority order, and already had the highly damage resistant material on hand.

With all that set, he suited up quickly and fiddled with the new over shoulder style sheath for his gunblade. It was a large weapon so he’d favored a hip draw but they’d wanted to break up the image he’d had so they sat down and designed an over shoulder model that could work with the jacket, it had taken less work than they’d imagined to design and he dressed to practice the draw, It was one hand friendly which he appreciated. With everything fitting well and no tugging or chafing He looked at himself in the mirror, lost in the new person he saw looking back.

“You said I shouldn’t shave as well?” He asked rubbing his chin, the first signs of stubble showing up. She made an affirmative noise off to the side, adjusting her gear as well.

She’d gotten herself a new head scarf and filled her bag with solid colors favoring blue and black as was her normal, paired to half calf black boots. She suited up beside him, half sleeve turtle neck under a vest jacket with her tactical webbing on top of it. A simple outfit, but one with lots of freedom of movement and more than a little room to be further customized if she wanted.

“TOUGH.” she said leaning over to tap a knuckle against his chin and he let out a small sound of amusement.

“Lazy more like. Whatever.” He fell back into the look still inspecting himself in the mirror.

“READY?” she asked him and he looked back. His face slipped into a hard game face and he nodded once.

“First thing in the morning. We talk to the Commander and then there’s no turning back.” He said, loosening the scabbard and jacket to shrug them off and try on the other shirts. She nodded and picked up her bag, walking out of his room.

Her face was firm but her mind was whirling. She doubted she would sleep but knew she should try.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Selphie, please. That said, thank you for reading, and I hope you will consider leaving me a comment with what I did right, and what I did wrong. 
> 
> 10/Jan/2021 - Edited for word choice, errors.


	8. Frost and Ashes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The mission begins, two against the world. A quick stop to visit old memories and then a breakneck race to the heart of the Galbadian war machine. Smuggled beneath the nose of the empire.

Standing at attention felt different to Squall now, especially so far out of uniform. He stood nearly shoulder to shoulder with Fujin. He wouldn’t lie and say he didn’t feel slightly silly with his hair cut like it was and wearing leathers. Mission requirements being what they are he would adapt. He glanced at Fujin, whose outfit was a little less outlandish but at least it had a kind of aesthetic match to his. The idea of “Warrior Chic” almost made him laugh, but he ruthlessly suppressed the break of decorum. 

His eyes focused back on the new acting Commander of Garden’s SeeD who was holding a folder with the eventually settled mission parameters they were aiming at. He could tell she was still frustrated with the lack of definition. That was par the course though for deep cover and infiltration missions. Quistis breathed evenly, she wore authority with an ease that she always had. Her blue eyes were clear and sharp like shards of stained glass. 

He couldn’t help but feel vindicated in his decision. She had stepped up into the role with ease. She’d had a lot of questions for him in a short private meeting just before dawn. She’d taken extensive notes and listened closely. It was a defining characteristic of her to take everything seriously. Some people called her two faced for her wildly different persona when off duty, but he knew it was dedication to being who she needed to be.

“Alright, the mission is approved, not that I had much say in it.” she said, shooting Squall a look he ignored. He figured at least one more barb was going to come his way. 

“Indefinite mission length, no set check in period. Operatives are encouraged to provide regular updates to Garden by whatever secure methods they can manage. Eventual objective identification of or elimination of the officers of the Red Geezard Battalion, and any similar groups.” Quistis closed the folder and sighed. Setting the folder down on her desk she turned back elbow in hand the other hand touching her chin. 

“I wish you both the best of luck.” She looked out the window of the classroom turned office. 

“Thank you Ma’am.” Squall said, saluting, mirrored by Fujin.

“And good luck to you as well. I doubt you’ll need it.” he said smoothly dropping back to a parade rest with ease. Quistis laughed quietly and smirked to herself. 

“Thank you, Squall. I’ll admit, I didn’t expect you to choose me as a successor.” She said putting her hands behind her back.

“Who else?” Squall asked easily. Fujin looked between them to the nearly matching smiles.

“Dismissed. Your lander is leaving in an hour from Balamb. You’re already packed I would hope.” She said turning her back on them to face the window fully.

Squall and Fujin stepped out of the office quickly. 

“READY?” She asked and Squall thought about it a moment.

“She is, I will admit I’m getting nerves now that I’m actually going.” He’s still carrying his smirk and apparently feeling rather honest. 

“SURVIVE.” Fujin quipped, casually.

“Easier with two.” He shot back, and it was her turn to smirk.

\-------------

Fisherman’s Horizon was a strange place to start their insertion into Galbadia, but when Fujin had explained it it had made sense. He suspected she had ulterior motives for wanting to start there, but could not fault her for twisting the mission to meet her own ends. Lord knows he’d done the same more than once. 

The trip via Lander was different, but actually made docking up with FH quite a bit easier. The base of the structure was an easier disembarkation point than the humorously slapdash gangway they’d often used during Balamb’s mobile periods. 

Crawling up onto the substructure aside Fujin and pulling their bags up behind them. Strapping them on tightly they took a moment to take stock out of the way of the four Garden faculty that had to stop at FH for other reasons. 

Squall followed Fujin, she walked confidently through town, her head scarf pulled to almost her eyebrows as she walked. They headed almost entirely around the disk like main structure to a small cabin leaning against the rods of a few of the solar panels. It looked like a lean-to that had slowly morphed into a kind of cabin made of corrugated metal, monster bones, rope, tarps and seemingly whatever else the occupant could get their hands on. It wasn’t pretty but Fujin seemed to almost inflate as they approached, her steps quick and light. Her heels didn’t even touch the ground for the last few steps as she rang a quite literal bell hanging from the awning.

“Yeah, Yeah, I’m home, it’s my day off y’...” the occupant started opening the door. It was Raijin. If he hadn’t heard his voice first he would never have recognized him. Raijin had always been built like a slab of muscle. He was unquestionably the most muscular and toned of any student at Garden. Now though… It was hard to reconcile that. He was still muscular. But more in the way of a laborer. His arms were corded but his torso had rounded some, the size and definition lost to a light blanket of fat. He still wore a brief vest around his shoulders letting his chest breathe. His hair had grown longer turned to dreadlocks and bound back with a braided piece of fishing line adorned with beads. And the beard. It was a little patchy but respectable. It leant him the airs of an old man of the sea, despite his relative youth. It was hard to remember this man was younger than he was. 

He stood a few steps back from Fujin. He had only a second to take in Raijin before the two of them were in each other’s arms. Fujin had wrapped her arms around him without hesitation her cheek pressed into his chest as he squeezed her back. One hand was a tight fist in the middle of her back and the other rested tenderly on the side of her head.

“Oh! Oh, Sis! What’re you doing here!? I thought you were gonna be in Galbadia for another month, y’know? You should have sent word I’d have something for ya!” He said tears misting up his eyes. She just squeezed harder.

“DIED.” she said, her voice muffled by being buried against him and her head turned down. 

“What? But you’re… oh... “ Raijin said slowly, his eyes walking up from the back of Fujin to Squall who stood awkwardly still, trying not to intrude.

“I can come back…” Squall said softly.

“Le~” Raijin started his browns knitting together.

“I lost. You said it was gonna happen and it happened.” Fujin said softly. And it was like the air got sucked out of Raijin. Squall turned and started to walk away.

“I’ll be back la~” He started to say, raising a hand.

“NO. STAY.” Fujin said, pulling her head back and looking at him harshly, her face a mess of tears like he’d only seen once before. 

Squall stopped in his tracks and turned around.

“Squall? I recognize that voice, y’know? You’re Squall Leonhart.” He said leaning back a bit to look down at Fujin. 

“What’s he doing here, I thought we were avoiding Garden. You said they were bagging anybody who was a former.” He said reaching back behind the door jam. 

“DINNER?” Fujin asked, pulling back a step, keeping her arms around him.

“It’s barely lunch time, Fu.” he said questioningly and even through the back of her head Squall could feel the look she gave him.

“Fine, fine, but I’m warning you, all I’ve got is fish and pickled vegetables…” he said chastising.

“GIL.” she said shortly, visibly tugging the bigger man.

“I couldn’t take your cash, especially if y’all’re on the run. Garden’s gotta be hella mad about their boy going punk on ‘um.” he said looking up at Squall with concern.

Squall awkwardly kicked a seashell that skittered pleasantly off the edge of the platform.

“Um… Funny story.” Squall said without a smile.

Raijin looked down at Fujin then back up at him. 

“Alright, both a’ yall got some explaining to do.” Raijin said more seriously.

Fujin picked what looked to be a cafe, but really seemed to be more akin to a full service restaurant. Squall couldn’t really complain as he crossed his legs and perused the menu, having picked the most distant of the ramshackle tables made of what looked for all the world like welded scrap metal. Probably was, like most things in FH. 

Fujin and Raijin were talking in their strange, stilted way. Fujin responded with single words while Raijin rambled through the last four or so months. It was mostly mundane minutiae of relationships with people he didn’t know and fishing jargon. It was weirdly soothing to listen to someone who really didn’t have an exciting life. 

They got food and Squall kept bracing for the start to the actual explanations to start, but they just didn’t. They ate, sat and nattered a while. Raijin had a whole conversation with the server as they paid in cash. They stood up from the place and walked in companionable silence all the way back to the little shack alike so many in FH and came inside to the very sparsely furnished space that was low tables and bundles of cloth standing in for furniture. The bed in the corner had no pillows and only the lightest of blankets. 

It would have been sad had it not been stuffed with art and small things. Many made of fish bones, carved into intricate shapes. Scrimshawed shells and bones in elaborate pieces hanging from the relatively low ceiling. Much of it was amatuer, full of little mistakes and odd choices, but wholly unique. 

The most striking of the art was a large piece of painted driftwood with pegs that held up a familiar and ornate Chakram, a weighted Bo staff, but most importantly a one handed gunblade. One he was extremely familiar with. Hyperion. From the first second he saw it he was startled out of the conversation that was just beginning. 

He walked through the home with cautious steps and stopped in front of it.

“We kept it.” The words shocked Squall and he jumped a little bit, the voice just over his shoulder. Fujin was standing staring at it as well. She'd spoken so softly but there was a weight to the words.

“It was wrapped up in the corner for so long, I thought it might get rusty. If I made something out of it, I could justify keeping it oiled, y’know?” Raijin added guiltily. 

“...He’d have liked it.” Squall said and all three of them lapsed into a heavy silence. It took many minutes before anybody felt like talking again, each lost in their own rememberings. 

“I believe…” Raijin trailed off, breaking the silence. 

“I believe you guys were gonna tell me a story.” Squall’s eyes turned to Fujin who was chewing on her lower lip.

“YES.” she said, turning around sharply. Squall turned on his heel to face them as Fujin flopped down on a pile of cloth where Raijin sat as well his back against the wall, settling in. Squall leaned against the wall, crossing his arms and legs. 

“You wanna tell it?” he asked and Fujin considered before looking up at him a moment then rubbing her fingers together thoughtfully.

“YOU.” she said looking back up. He shrugged and started.

He tried to keep a neutral tone, sticking to the facts of the ambush in Sawton. He saw Fujin nod gravely as Raijin looked to her when he described her injuries and their conversation.

“So it’s really that bad out there, huh…?” Raijin mused quietly as Squall gathered his thoughts.

Squall didn’t comment but instead talked about Fujin’s exploits in her two weeks, the exhibition match gone wild, the fight in the showers, her test and her graduation. 

“...And that’s where we are, She has insider knowledge of a group that’s going to keep Galbadia destabilized for potentially years longer than it needs to. We, and by that I mean Garden and the Respective governments of the world, would like the fighting to be over and a winner declared.” Squall finished. Raijin nodded sagely, rubbing his bearded chin with one hand thoughtfully.

“Alright. Alright, that’s a hell of a story. One more question though, Fu, when you start carrying a gunblade around?” He asked, pointing to the sheath on her bag. Squall and Fujin looked at eachother. He had left out their daily training sessions. It hadn’t felt relevant to Squall in his story. Fujin opened her mouth though.

“TAUGHT.” she said jerking her head at Squall.

“He taught you? When’d you learn the one handed style?” Raijin asked, looking genuinely surprised.

“You can’t fight someone more or less every day and not learn a thing or three. Plus, I used one once upon a time. I learned the basics of both weapons before I committed to the two handed model. Seifer did the same, in reverse of course.” Squall said, waving a hand about. Raijin considered looking from Fujin to Squall and back. A frown on his face.

“I see.” he finally settled on saying. He was looking Fujin in the eye who looked nervous, her restlessness increasing by the second before she grimaced and sighed.

“LITTLE...” she said, rubbing a hand past her nose and pushing back her head scarf to run her fingers through her hair and along her scalp.

“Hm…” Raijin answered looking back at Squall with an appraising look on his face, considering him differently. Squall wanted badly to ask, but knew he wouldn’t get a terribly helpful answer from either of them, judging that he kept his peace, his eyes found their way back to the weapon display. His eyes tracing the familiar weapon, even though it brought up bad memories for him.

“It brought back a lot of painful memories. But… I… It’s a good match, it’s… comfortable… even though it hurts…” Fujin whispered. Struggling with each word and phrase. Squall felt uncomfortable listening to her talk. It felt like an invasion of her privacy but there wasn’t really anywhere to go, Raijin was blocking the door. 

“I’m listening, little sister.” Raijin spoke softly, egging her on. Squall flinched slightly, his discomfiture deepening.

“It feels like I’m taking back some part of it.” She said in one breath and then gasped as though it had hurt her to say it.

“People hate him so much, in Deling, in Esthar, in Balamb, in the East, and the West.” Fujin said, her growling voice thick with emotion. Squall looked away, his eyes finding their way back to Hyperion. 

“You remember, when I started using the Chakram, what Seifer said?” Fujin’s voice was still very small, prompting one to even try to breathe quietly to not miss her words.

“Not really….” Raijin’s admittance was soft and sheepish.

Fujin sighed and brushed her fingers through her hair pushing it back from her eyepatch. Two fingers gently rubbed the skin of her cheek where the eyepatch’s bottom rested.

“It’s not important, but, when I fought alone, changing to a melee weapon was just easier, my magic has always been my strongest, um, asset.” she continued finding a rythme.

“So being able to actually parry and make use of the strength of the junction more directly just made sense, right? So I started using a sword, there’s tons of them in Galbadia, you can get one for less than a thousand gil. Then when… Well, I started training with Squall… and, we sparred a lot, and we got to talking about weapons and balance and what makes a good weapon, and he suggested gunblades, as an option. When we tried it, it was his suggestion to try the one handed model.” She lapsed into silence. Squall wished he had a drink or something to do with his hands. Both Fujin and Raijin were staring at him with strange looks on their faces. He couldn’t return their glare, this whole thing was becoming painfully awkward.

“That must have dug up some things.” Raijin muttered into his beard, putting his hand over his face, muffling what he said.

“...Yeah.” Fujin said, sounding tired. 

“I still get flashes. But… It feels… right? Good? I don’t know. I like the one handed model. It’s the best weapon I’ve wielded.” She reached to her pack and pulled out the long, fine bladed weapon, unadorned as it was and with the same sort of blade curve as the larger cousins, convex rather than concave. Concave like the Hyperion’s blade was, the comparison was inescapable as she held it out at arm’s length. 

“Could use some grip mold adjustments.” Squall murmured, more to have something to say than anything. Fujin actually snorted audibly, a hand slapping to her mouth as soon as she made the completely undignified noise. Raijin’s laughter only made her blush as he slapped his knee, the tension that had been building broken.

“THANKS.” Fujin groused. The blade’s tip lowered to rest on the floor

“Whatever.” Squall said softly, only making Raijin laugh harder.

“Oh, you two are too much, y’know?” He managed to squeeze out while catching his breath and wiping a tear from his eye.

“SMOKE.” Fujin added morosely.

“You started smoking again?” Raijin jumped on her comment. She looked away from him reaching back to her pack to holster her blade.

“She got a commendation for giving tabs to her teammates during her exam.” Squall added innocently. Fujin glared hard at him while Raijin looked cross. 

She mumbled some kind of words Squall couldn’t even understand and Raijin just shook his head with his arms crossed.

“ADULT.” she said sharply, raising her head back toward Raijin.

“OLDER!” she added pointing at him. Raijin for his part put on a heavy frown of disappointment.

“You’re supposed to be the smart one, those things hurt you, and you know it.” Squall tried really hard not to laugh but made a small noise.

“UNDERSTAND!” Fujin said hopping from a full seated position to a low crouch in one smooth motion, Raijin pointed at her.

“OH yeah! Because this is mature behavior, gettin’ all at somebody who’s just lookin’ out for you, ya know?” Fujin flopped back down glaring at Raijin.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” And she was right back on her feet with her hackles fully raised and practically hissing.

“Huh, I guess she is a cat.” Squall comments innocently. Fujin turned pink and looked absolutely furious while Raijin split into peals of laughter.

“TRAITOR!” She said rounding on Squall who simply crossed his arms and held his ground as he had been. It took several seconds until she sat back down. 

“You here for Hyperion then, I guess?” Raijin said softly, the laughter fading from his voice. Squall and Fujin looked at eachother. All three of them slowly looked up at Hyperion. It rested heavy, almost accusatory on the wall. Squall was first to look away from it. Raijin lasted longer before standing to fill a small cup with water from a barrel in the corner that Squall followed him over. 

Fujin stared at the weapon on the wall. She stood and walked to the wall and raised a hand, laying it on the flat of the blade. She looked over at Squall and Raijin. Raijin had put an arm around Squall’s shoulders. The smaller man looked extremely uncomfortable but they stepped outside together and she reached up pulling the weapon down from its pegs. Holding it in her hands it was heavier than she remembered. Like it was made of lead not steel. But it was lighter than hers as well. She fitted her hand to the grip and held it out fully stretched. It was longer than hers. Every small movement resisted her direction. The balance was very different, several inches further toward her hand. She twisted her hand and drove a small figure eight with the tip. She could feel it, watch with her eye where the blade twisted.

“PROUD?” she asked in a bare whisper looking past it to the wall, to her Chakram, to the Bo. 

She experimentally thrust with the blade, a move she was fairly comfortable with. The tip deviated wildly and she frowned. She pulled back and thrust again, again it swiveled.

“ANGRY?” she asked her voice harsh even to her own ears. She swept it and her wrist smarted as she tried to arrest the swing short like she could with her own. She lay it across her hands touching the long empty flat of the blade. He’d never marked it like Squall had. She remembered the roaring lion on his blade when they’d been students. Running her fingers over the metal she really thought about it all.

“What did you stand for Seifer, besides the idea that Seifer Almasy should be somebody.” She asked bitterly. The weapon almost laughed at her, she could hear his laugh in her head and it made her furious. She swallowed that anger, the bitterness and hung Hyperion back where it belonged, on the wall. A memory of a man who was her best friend, her closest confidant, but as soon as he had a modicum of power it showed who he probably always was. A child trying to be the knight in his story book.

She walked back to her bag and ripped her gunblade from its sheath.

“MORE!” she said in a fierce hiss, and stalked outside past the two boys in the middle of a tight conversation that interrupted as she brushed past them.

“Hey! Hey, Fu where you goin?” Raijin called after her, Squall however stepped back inside after only a moment and emerged with his gunblade on his shoulder and followed her without a word.

\-----

Squall was bewildered when Raijin’s thick arm landed across his shoulders. He allowed himself to be led outside into the warm humid night. 

“So, you two are gonna be traveling together, huh?” Raijin asked, sipping his water from a cup that more closely resembled a tall bowl. Squall drank from a similar vessel to buy time more than anything.

“Yes. Until we accomplish our mission, or find out it’s impossible.” Squall responded. Raijin digested that for a moment and nodded.

“We’re blood her and I, not by birth, I don’t think… but… I think you understand.” Raijin said, Squall nodded. He had some feelings that resembled that, for a few people, Ellone, once he remembered her. Quistis, Selphie, Zell, Irvine when he was feeling generous. A family he adopted and who had been through the end of the world with him. 

“I care about her, you know? I write letters to her whenever I can, a lot of my spending money is spent sending people on wild goose chases for her so I can write. And she writes back. We’re all we’ve had for a long time now, you know?” Raijin admitted tapping his bowl to the building softly. Squall listened, sipping occasionally.

“I see.” Squall said by way of acknowledgement. Raijin took a moment to study Squall. He turned his head away to take a longer drink, sighing as he brought it away from his mouth. 

“I wanted her to stay here, she walked out on me, more than two years ago. Because I was happy here with a net in my hands, and she wasn’t. She wanted something to make her feel like she had a reason to be alive. Living quiet wasn’t good enough for my sister.” Raijin sounded just a touch bitter about the whole thing but he sighed softly, when he spoke again it was more hopeful.

“She’ll have somebody now to watch out for her. I'm sure she told you what it was like out there, you know? But she didn’t tell you everything.” Raijin paused weighing the vessel in his hand, watching the water ripple and dance a moment before he spoke again, more quietly. 

“It got dark. Really dark. The last couple times she made it home... well, here, she was a wreck. She’s got magical skill like a Trabian, so the scars are all on the inside, you know?” Raijin said. Squall opened his mouth to respond but Raijin kept going. 

“Keep…” Raijin started and trailed off as Fujin loudly stomped her way out the door and past them. Her eye focused ahead and her gunblade held at a low ready. Raijin’s arm loosened and Squall ducked under it even as Raijin started to speak. Squall walked straight to his gunblade and swung it up to walk after her without a word. She walked out to the edge to stand staring out at the Sea. The wind and the salt spray throwing glittering light dancing in the mid afternoon air. Raijin was left standing at his home, bothered but ultimately deciding to stay back, just like he had been for two years now. This was the new way for them, afterall, it had to be. Squall though, strode right up to stand a few steps behind her. 

“RAGE!” She screamed out at the water her fists white knuckle as she swept the blade so fiercely it whistled shrilly as though parting the gusts. Squall waited as she paced up and down the edge fencing ghosts with her blade her eye far away in her own mind. He doubted she knew he was even there. No, she probably did. But he judged she had something to work out. He waited, it took many long minutes and a lot of hissing and spitting and muttering from Fujin before she had calmed down enough to look at him, even if she didn’t face him. Squall, for his part simply stood silent witness to her anger, a rock unmoved by the wind’s fury.

“FIGHT?” she asked, raising her gunblade to a low ready. 

“If it’ll help.” Squall’s response gave her pause. She looked at him then, her face tugged into a frown that always twitched to threaten a scowl but never formed one. 

“NO.” she said finally lowering her gunblade again and turning to stare out at the sea again. Squall considered her back, her posture, the way her hands stayed curled into fists though they loosened now. The tension in her shoulders that had nothing to do with keeping the tip of the gunblade from dragging on the concrete. He raised his chin and paused, he realized he was resolved to open his mouth only in the instant before he heard the words come out of his mouth.

“Is this about the Hyperion?” He asked, considering the question even as he saw the wave of tension shoot through her. 

“...YES.” she answered looking back at him over her shoulder, just a glance really. It let him know that he had asked the right question.

“I’m guessing you don’t want it.” He stated she simply nodded. 

“Headmaster Cid once cautioned me to let sleeping dogs lie, not sure how that is relevant, but it feels like it is.” Squall shrugged helplessly and Fujin let out a little snort of amusement.

“RIGHT.” Fujin took a deep breath, raising the gunblade up to hold it perpendicular to the ground and examined it casually.

“Did you get what we came here to get?” Squall asked softly, Fujin sagged slightly and then smiled. 

“YES.”

\--------

Evening had set in by the time they left FH, the sky was painted as they held onto the back of a train, not technically passengers, but clinging to the rear like stowaways. Technically illegal sure, but so common that it simply wasn’t stopped. They hopped off at the end of the horizon bridge after the sun had finished setting. 

There were the ruins of a small stopover point on the bluffs at the Galbadian end of the Horizon bridge overlooking Mandy beach. It had never been repopulated after the first war, let alone the second when the bridge served a purpose again. The buildings were structurally sound enough. In a small corner store was evidence of old camp-fires. The space picked clean and everything pushed out of the way to make open floor space. A note hung from a chain mentioning that the skylight could be opened. All around them there was a deep feeling of foreboding it clung to the whole place like the very air was charged with negativity.

Shelter from the roaring wind and oncoming storm from the ocean was the goal, they’d already rode through the storm once on the way in and were not eager to brave it again with wet clothes. So they split to different sides of the building and changed into the next day’s clothes, much the same as today’s before hanging up the soaked garments to dry a short distance away. 

Looking at the clothes they went out into the night and quickly gathered enough for a small fire, mostly a single dry-rotted wooden chair and the fallen branches of a few hardy trees that clung to the hills. Squall reached into his pocket for his lighter and froze as Fujin snorted. Squall sighed and raised an eyebrow at her. She reached into her pocket, pulled out the empty pack of cigarettes, threw away the package after tossing him the lighter. Squall got the, luckily, still dry timber burning after a little work, while Fujin climbed a shelving unit to open the skylight enough to get a draft going. With the small fire roaring they moved the clothes to be within its warm circle. She used her high position to look around, checking the entrances and escapes, looking for anything that could account for her bad feeling that still buzzed at the base of her skull putting her teeth on edge and hair on end. It only deepened her unease when she found no accounting for it.

The two of them sat down near to the fire. Squall with his back against a shelving unit seemingly placed for the purpose. Fujin hugging her knees both of them had their weapons within arms reach. As much as this place gave her intense misgivings Squall looked completely relaxed. Not the most reliable of measures, he was a very guarded person but she took his outward relaxation for license to put the feeling up to nerves. They were, afterall, back in hostile territory.

Watching the smoke curl and twist into the skylight Squall found himself hypnotized by the performance. The sheer intricacy of the twisting particulate upon the updraft was enough to let his mind settle on unconscious things. Fujin seemed of similar mind though she watched the flames instead, her red eye reflecting the dancing plasma with terrible clarity, trusting Pandemona to awake her in an instant if hostiles appeared. 

\--------------

Waking up in the field is always a bit of an experience. Squall’s eyes snapped open and slowly glided across the space, looking for any changes. Not finding any he took a deep breath and slowly started to move. Stretching as he went and when he made it to his feet he was limber enough to move freely. 

Across the space Fujin was laying on her back on the tile stretched out and staring up at the skylight around the cold ashes that had been blown around by the drafty space. He looked at her curiously as she made a small sound of effort and her back left the cracked tile of the floor with a staccato series of pops and crackles. 

He straightened his clothes and resettled his kit. Checking over his pack and lifting it to a shoulder with a small package of field rations in his hand. Fujin did similarly as they stood to head out. It was a bit of a long walk to Timber and they hadn’t wanted to come in on the back of a train and gotten more questions than they really wanted to deal with. Ironically walking in from the hills would probably get them less attention.

“BAD FEELING.” Fujin said as they walked. It had been crawling up her spine since they hopped off the train. She had thought it just nerves, but it had persisted. Her instincts were screaming at her, and she couldn’t ignore it anymore and she wanted to address it before they even got out of sight of the ghost town.

“Sorry, that’s my fault.” Squall said, and for a few moments the feeling fell away.

“WHAT?” She asked, looking at him incredulously. What the hell was he doing that would be causing this awful feeling of impending doom.

“Diablos. It’s one of my Guardian Forces. He produces this aura when I let him, it keeps monsters far away so it’s fairly useful, if you can handle a serious case of the heebie jeebies… I do feel it too for the record.” Squall said looking back at her to see her considering.

“MANY?” she asked and Squall mulled over being honest eventually deciding that he was being silly.

“Four, Diablos, Doomtrain, Shiva, and Siren.” He said listing them on his fingers starting from his little finger. Fujin looked at him with a critical eye. 

“Not much elemental force, but a great deal of utility. You’re using two right? Pandemona, and… Strigoi was it?” Squall asked and Fujin nodded.

“WIND. ICE.” Squall nodded thoughtfully. After their little conversation Fujin filed the bad feeling as being Squall and tried to put it out of mind as they walked toward Timber the veil of darkness back to exuding from Squall full force

. The high rise of the Timber Maniacs building rose above the rolling hills and they approached easily enough. The walls of the city rose slowly, only about twenty feet high but even at range they could see that they were manned. As the two of them approached they could see a crowd of people near the gates. Someone was shouting, holding up a winged icon of some kind. Squall politely asked Diablos to cease his bad vibes as they pulled closer.

“We are free brothers and sisters! Free, but for how long!? Galbadia will not stay away forever, and when they return will you be ready!? Join up! The Wings of Freedom will sail into Galbadia, we will crush them where they live, let them taste the pain of having their houses burned, their families living in fear! Join us to strike back!” There were a large number of people standing around, many of them armed. Not shocking. Timber might actually be the most heavily militarized city-state in the world. Decades under Galbadian heel had given rise to a widespread militia and resistance movement. Clashes in Timber had been the largest drain on the Galbadian military outside their campaigns. 

Squall considered the recruiter sceptically, he didn’t like the odds of a Timber Guerilla movement’s chances against either of the Galbadias. This was just another destabilizing force looking to tip the balance. Problem was, they really only had access to East Galbadia. Unless they planned to sneak through it to the west. Squall rather doubted that they would bother. Galbad was Galbad to most folks outside the conflict. 

The two walked past the preacher and his crowd of onlookers without comment. They made it up to the walls where a checkpoint had been set into the walls. A Timber guard dressed in blotchy greens and blacks stood with a winged spear he was leaning on stopped them with a hand.

“Business, tough?” He said sharply, his tone derisive. Squall’s initial offense was probably not helping his case. Fujin however stepped up and pulled one of her ID cards out of her pocket.

“RETURNING.” she said sharply. The guard looked at Fujin and her card but slid back to Squall constantly. He took her ID and slid the corner of a Gil note out from behind it and it slid into his pocket.

“...That covers you Miss, what about your boy here?” Squall’s face fell from a frown into a scowl.

“WITH.” She said casually and the guard sized her up. There was a tense moment before he stood up and jerked his head past the walls.

“Fine, stay out of trouble.” He said and the two of them quickly walked into town. Squall nodded to Fujin who shrugged one shoulder. The town hadn’t physically changed much, but the energy in the place was different. People walked the streets armed. The shops were more sparsely stocked, but spirits were high, people were laughing, children were in the streets. Squall found himself relaxing as they walked. They had a few things they wanted to accomplish, and stopped to buy local rations. It was really just a pass through. 

Squall had information on a smuggler, and they were in town to find him and secure travel to Western Galbadia, all the way to Deling if they could manage it. It took some conversations, a few meetings in the back of shops and a deal of gil passing hands but eventually Squall and Fujin found themselves in a warehouse packing into an armored carrier filled with crates they helped load, careful to work together to not give away their strength. It wasn’t too hard, there were about a dozen other workers, some who looked fairly ill suited to the job they were doing. A pair of young women, a child, three men, one adult and two younger. When it was all loaded they all squeezed into the carriers as the door was shut. It didn’t take long before they were moving. 

Active war or not, trade was money, when legal trade was made impossible, the sub market rises. Black market traders and underground sellers, weapons and exotics in peacetime, food and bigger weapons in wartime. Gil rolls downhill as the saying goes. The trip was fairly tense. The young women and the child hung close together, the three males as well. They were all dressed in unremarkable clothes with few belongings. None of them were armed. All six of them eyed the two SeeD with undisguised suspicion. Not only because they had chosen the space closest to the rear gate. Conversations were quiet and private. Fujin and Squall stayed out of them both watching and waiting. Fujin caught a few hours nap here and there, when she woke up Squall would nap. Both of them had their weapons loose in their sheaths. 

One of the times Squall was asleep one of the women very cautiously siddled closer to speak in a soft voice. 

“Um, are we going to stop soon? Flisa wants to stretch her legs?” The woman spoke very cautiously, watching Fujin’s face but glancing at her hands constantly. 

“UNKNOWN.” Fujin responded then her brow pulled down and the woman rushed to apologize her hands shooting up, which made Fujin jump just a bit and nearly sent the woman backwards.

“Sorry! Sorry! I did not want to offend, I just hoped you could…” She started and Fujin held up a hand. 

“ILLEGAL.” she said hooking a thumb at herself. 

“What?” the woman asked, looking puzzled. Fujin sighed, lost in the rumbling of the truck.

“ALIKE.” she said pointing between herself and the woman.

“You’re going to Deling, too?” Fujin nodded. 

“You don’t work for Samuel?” The woman’s companion asked. Fujin shook her head slightly, her eye sliding to the new speaker. 

“NEITHER.” She added motioning to Squall. She could tell that she wasn’t really being well understood but it didn’t matter. Last thing she wanted was these people thinking she was some kind of enforcer when her skin was on the other side of this relationship. It had been a fair assumption. She and Squall were literally dressed like Deling street trash. She pulled down her headscarf before she sat down. She could feel eyes on her but choose to ignore them. 

The woman withdrew and the conversation started up again, faster. 

She fished in her webbing and pulled out a brand new pack of Deling specials. The price was outrageous, but that’s the cost of black market goods. Some light intimidation had gotten her a modest discount all the same. She jostled one of the rolls out of the soft pack and pulled it out with her lips. She paused then and looked at the six civilians and put the pack away. Leaving the roll in her mouth, crossing her arms and leaning back against the wall. She played with the smoke in her lips. The air in the cargo truck was a little less tense at least. A few minutes later she pulled the roll from her mouth and tucked it behind her ear with a scowl, deciding that filling the tiny space with smoke would only ratchet back up the tension, or draw the attention of the drivers. 

The ride was slow, part of a convoy of five vehicles with outriders to help dissuade monsters. Stops were frequent but nobody was allowed out of the carrier, rough terrain threw them against walls and getting stuck on the unmaintained roads was not uncommon either. The slow cooling of the metal shell told Fujin it was nearing nightfall. She knew she was pretty badly cramped up from sitting like she had been. Squall hadn’t complained but she’d seen him trying to stretch his legs as well. 

\----------------------------------------

They finally stopped many hours into the drive, after dark. They were only allowed about 20 minutes as a quick maintenance pass was done on the trucks and a head count was made. Fujin took in the other people that were being moved into Deling. Some of them were probably actual workers to unload the trucks and head home, the minority she guessed. Though she had to question where some of the people she saw got the money to make the journey and decided that thinking about that would make her day worse. One glance at Squall’s tight face and scowl told her he was likely thinking along the same lines. She took her moment outside to have a smoke, her nerves slowly fraying from the lack of doing anything. They were herded back aboard the trucks, packed away. There was one more break before the train bridge crossing. 

The crossing itself was a slow affair where there was a long delay as the smugglers had to negotiate each Galbadian army at opposite ends of the bridge. There was a heart stopping moment when on the west side of the bridge the rear gate unlocked and opened. 

Squall and Fujin pulled back into the alcoves they were sitting in and the others cowered behind whatever they could. The red-garbed elite stood with a terminal in his hands, he looked right past most of the people hiding poorly amongst the produce. The East Galbadian Elite commander towered nearly seven feet of armor and integrated weaponry. Squall had seen images of the new exoskeletal support suits but seeing it first hand was a different experience. It was the midpoint between the cutting edge GIM52A and the old elite hardsuit. Oversized arms were still standard, the helmet was full face covering now and his voice was being piped out through a speaker somewhere in the torso. It would have been pretty scary, if he hadn’t fought an Iron Giant in the past, or Estharian Terminators for that matter. The soldier’s actuated lenses hovered on Squall then Fujin. 

“You two. You don’t look like the normal type, what’s your business in Galbadia?” He barked sharply. Squall looked at Fujin who gave him a small upward nod.

“Mercenaries sir, heard there’s work in Deling.” Squall answered, purposefully adding a quaver to his voice. Best to let military types think they’re in charge.

“Hmph. Where are you from?” he asked suspiciously looking at Fujin, Squall, lucky for him, had two galbadian parents and had the look of the local around him. Fujin however with her sharp features and off-coloration.

“She’s with m~” The soldier cut off Squall with a raised hand.

“I didn’t ask you shit, kid.” the officer said with a raised exo-glove pointed at Squall. Fujin was watching this exchange and considering her response. Settling she spoke up.

“CENTRA.” an easier answer than what little she remembered of her childhood.

“Watch your tone, kid. You’re talking to the actual military! Centra, a fucking Tribal? What are you doing so far from home little girl?” He said in a mocking tone. Pointing at her with an oversized hand. Fujin almost sighed in relief, she was concerned she’d already been ID’d. It wasn’t impossible but it would complicate things for sure. She ducked her head and said nothing more. This seemed to satisfy the commander as he craned his head and tapped at his slate.

“Accounted for, if the strays haven’t been picking at it.” He said dismissively swatting the outrider who was standing by the side of the vehicle with the manifests hard enough to almost bowl him over.

“Get out of my sight.” He said as the doors closed cutting off the exchange. Squall let out a long sigh, Fujin’s was more of a pop. 

“You’re mercenaries?” One of the men in the back said, a bit of anger in his voice. 

Squall and Fujin looked at eachother a moment, Squall’s eyes flicked to the direction of the voice. The corner of Fujin’s mouth curled and her eye looked down at his pack. Squall rubbed the side of one of his knuckles with his thumb for a moment and Fujin spoke up.

“YES.” Her voice was hard, and accusatory as she turned her body to face the back of the space.

“Jakom be quiet!” said the older man of the group.

“They kill people for money!” The younger voice hissed back.

“They may only kill monsters! Use your head!” the older man argued back increasingly quietly though his tone was more angry than ever.

“Do you kill people!?” The boy said louder. Squall and Fujin shared another moment of silent communication. She scowled and thumbed her knee, wiping away something he didn’t see. Squall’s hand wandered up to the sword still sheathed over his shoulder. Fujin’s nostrils flared in a silent huff.

“If the coin is right.” Squall said unwavering. He looked the young man dead in the eye and he saw him flinch. The accusations stopped with the unspoken threat lingering in the air. Fujin fidgeted a little. Her earlier work to lessen the tension lost to the edge of truth. Nothing to be done about it. She could think of a lie, but it was too flimsy to try she admitted to herself. Better off letting the civvs be upset or unsettled than getting singled out more than they had. 

\---------------------------

They continued on through the darkness and into the dawn, pushing through the scorching heat of the savannah like terrain at the borders of the Dingo Desert on their way up through the great plains to the capital itself, stopping only when they pulled into a large fenced lot at the edges of the city. 

All of the immigrants were quickly and quietly shuffled off the trucks, following Timber workers to a side building where they were all housed together. There was a palpable aura of relief from most of them and Squall got his first glimpse of the place in three years. The city of night, smogtown, the industrial capital that fueled the Galbadian war machine. It’s buildings were all fairly short and imperial in style, borrowed from Dollet but with a brutal edge. 

And the clouds. Night was sharp here, but daylight was somehow worse. The clouds hung low, collecting over the city and bringing an ashy taste to the air. The smog of industry collected over the city. A confluence of the shape of the terrain and a prevailing breeze from the nearby ocean caused the clouds to hang in a way not fully understood. Even here in the dawn it was filtered ruddy brown like a banked ember. It was said the city got unfiltered sunlight maybe three days a year. The population was heavily industrialized and there was endless work to be doing. Forging the steel of the country that formed the skeleton of all their works, refining the magic stone that fueled their expansion, splitting the fuel that lit the streets when nothing else could. 

The city burned with the dawn and the sirens of motion in the street, military vehicles moved along the roads at breakneck pace, besides busses and the occasional private vehicle. Hydraulics gushed, people shouted, brakes screamed, and in the distance gunshots rang out. Trucks loaded deep with materials trundled to and fore. It only took a minute to cross the yard, but it left an impression he knew he wasn’t alone in feeling. Of strength, of sprawl, and of an intimate familiarity with violence. 

City of Flames, City of War, Jewel in shade, Vinzer’s Legacy, Deling City.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With this, arc 2 begins and the story starts in earnest. Thank you for following me thought to this point, updates will become even slower as I enter a busy period at work. 30/09/20
> 
> as always, thank you to the people who left comments and kudos, it really is greatly bouying to see them come up.


	9. Long Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arriving in Deling, the work waits.

It had been fairly easy to break away from the other immigrants once the pair had made it clear they would not be compelled to do more than they already had. The two SeeD had to walk away from people doing more work, smuggling turning into trafficking was not what they were here to fight, no matter how distasteful. The smuggler was a SeeD contact and they couldn’t afford to antagonize him, according to Squall. Fujin had wanted to beat him as a lesson. Later, he said. 

Walking the streets Squall fell back and followed Fujin, who had raised her head scarf again. The air was dirty and Squall quickly found his nose and throat tickling and scratching. He tried to be subtle about coughing until he saw others openly doing so and just let it go. It didn’t help for more than a few moments. Squall had worried that openly carrying a weapon might attract the wrong kind of attention but as they walked he saw that though most of them were a lot smaller than theirs nearly everyone was openly armed. From knives on the thigh to a few better dressed people with fancifully decorated firearms in worked leather holsters. Some people were not obviously armed, many of them traveled in groups. Some of them were conspicuously unarmed because their bodyguards were not.

Fujin was laser guided though. She walked in from the outskirts and took precise turns. Squall followed without a word, he imagined that he would find out what needed to be known when it became important. They stopped in front of a fairly run down building, a group of people not dissimilarly dressed to Squall hovered around the door. As they approached hands subtly shifted toward belts and blades. Squall held down the instinct to do the same because Fujin didn’t react. He stuck close to her as she walked past them into the building with barely a glance at the group. The inside of the building was in similar condition. The lights were almost all on, the rugs were dirty, the finish on the wooden floors was worn away in most places. She lead them up two floors past a great number of open doors, conversations in the hallways. Normal people like you’d find anywhere for the most part. 

Almost nobody had weapons in here. Just the people that Fujin had modeled Squall’s appearance after, Toughs. There was at least one of them lurking in each hallway, often sitting in a chair. Without fail every one of them gave Squall a challenging look, and without fail he icily ignored them. Fujin seemed to arrive where she was headed, stopping sharply. It was an unassuming door on the side of the building that faced an alley, she turned the handle without hesitation. It was locked, rather than bothering her she nodded sharply and kept climbing to the top floor. At the top the building was nicer, the floors less worn out, the lights didn’t flicker. Though there was still a tough sitting in a chair in the hallway. Fujin walked up to a door and knocked firmly and loudly. Music inside stopped but nothing happened for a minute, Fujin knocked again, more forcefully. The tough at the end of the hallway looked like he was getting ready to stand up. Squall turned his head to consider the man who may well have been older than him. They stayed in a kind of stalemate while Fujin glared a hole in the door until it finally opened.

“What the~ oh. You again. Let me guess, you lost another key?” The man said he was middle aged, imposing once but now going to fat around the middle. His arms were still strong though and he wore a small well groomed mustache. As he turned around grumbling and closed the door it showed off a growing bald spot on the back of his head. This interaction seemed to be enough for the tough who settled back down in his chair. In a minute the man came back out with a small bowler hat on his head and a ring of keys in his hand. He brushed past Fujin without care, muttering to himself. Squall shook his head but followed without commentary. They’d managed to avoid saying one word so far, Fujin hadn’t even nodded her head at his question, as though it were a given. Which apparently it was. 

Following the man downstairs people got out of his way as they walked. Squall noted a lot of dark glares at the man when his back was turned. 

“You would turn up at Six Fucking AM, Lee.” The man said seemingly talking to Fujin who shrugged by way of answer. Squall filed the name away. 

“And you’re behind on rent again, the fuck have you been for the last month!? You owe, and I expect it by tomorrow.” He said shoving the key in the door of the locked apartment and throwing the door open so it rebounded against the wall. Fujin stuck her hand in a pocket and pulled out a precisely folded stack of Gil. She thrust it out hitting him in the shoulder far more gently than it seemed she wanted to. He pulled back then snatched the bills and counted them on the spot. Muttering under his breath. 

“Fine, whatever. On the fifth next month.” The man said turning to stalk away, Fujin reached out and grabbed him as he tried to leave. Her grip made him wince. He paused, struggled with the key ring and pulled one of a small stack of keys off and thrust it over his shoulder at her. She took it almost daintily.

“THANKS.” she said with a sharp tone. He grumbled, pulling his arm out of her grip and stomping away back toward the upstairs. 

Stepping inside the apartment Squall followed her before dropping her bag in the middle of the floor, turning around to close and lock the door behind them before letting out a deep sigh. Squall looked around taking in the bare walls with a few errant stains that seemed old and had marred the drywalling. A desk stood against one wall,l with a phone on it connected to an answering machine advertising thirty seven messages. The rest of the space was nearly bare open floor, There were no pictures, no nick-nacks, just bare walls and floors. A cheap looking stamp metal table, a well-used ashtray rested on it, with a similarly styled chair stood neatly pushed in. The “kitchen”, really just a small area of linoleum around an anorexic looking refrigerator and a four burner stove top beside a sink with about three square feet of countertop. The garbage can was empty of a bag and standing right next to the table. In the, well, what would be the living room there was nothing beside the desk, not even a chair. He could see two plain doors, one led into an obvious bathroom judging by the tile, the other he presumed was the bedroom. The air was dead and stale with the lingering smell of cigarette smoke clinging desperately to the dust.

“Home?” Squall asked skeptically, Fujin walked over to the table holding her elbow. 

“ABSENT.” she muttered. She punched the button on the answering machine with one finger perhaps too harshly. Squall awkwardly stood in the middle of the room as a voice started speaking, it was a man who identified himself as Jeb. He was trying to get in touch with “Lee” about some kind job at the coast. She was hitting delete even as he spoke, the answering machine obligingly removed it with a beep, cutting the man off. So it went as Squall walked around the ascetic apartment. He spun the ashtray slowly on the table, apparently it had originally belonged to a place named “Albert’s”. He didn’t ask if she had purchased it. He walked to the refrigerator and opened it. The inside was completely barren aside from a bottle of dark mustard and a small container of vinegar.. Squall closed the refrigerator, his hand paused on the handle. He wasn’t sure what he had expected. She said she wasn’t really here. He opened up the cupboard under the sink, finding a jar of cleansing powder, one small pot, one small kettle, a metal cup, a very large mug, and a small bowl with one spoon, three forks, and one small paring knife resting in it. All of them had a fine layer of dust on them. He closed the cupboard and walked over to hover over her as she was deleting old messages one by one, usually as soon as she heard the name. As he stepped up to her she turned to face him tapping the machine to pause its playback. He looked at her, as she looked back and her eye slid back down to the answering machine. She shifted her weight conspicuously from one foot to the other and let go of her elbow to lean on the desk. She glanced back up at him, which drew his eyes back to hers. They both fell again. She sighed and huffed quietly and tapped a finger on the desk before speaking in a whisper. 

“ALONE.” her tone was guarded, and the red color slowly climbing up her neck and out from her cheeks told him clearly of her embarrassment. He waved a hand subtly, brushing away her comment. She hit the button on the answering machine a moment later to avoid having to say more. The messages resumed and she continued to delete them. There were a variety of voices. Men and women, younger and older. A few much more frequent than others. As time went on some of the voices got more angry but she continued deleting them until she got to the last week. Two days ago someone named Venta had left a polite message requesting a call back to schedule a meeting about a delivery of daffodils.. Fujin frowned fiercely.

“Geezard?” Squall’s eyebrow rose up with the soft question. Fujin shook her head subtly.

“GANGER. LINK.” She said leaving the answering machine paused and dialing the phone. Standing so close Squall could hear the ringing in the relative quiet of the apartment. It rang four times before someone picked up.

“Venta flowers, how may I help you?” The voice was a young woman, not the same who left the message, but the name was the same. Fujin’s response was crisp and sure.

“DAFFODILS.” she said and the woman on the other end started audibly bobbling the phone a moment.

“Oh! A-alright, um, right. One moment please!” The woman said and the line was taken up by quiet piano music. About one minute later a man with a familiar voice picked up.

“Lee? I was beginning to think you’d finally gotten in over your head.” He said with a friendly but cold tone, distant. Fujin rolled her eye at Squall.

“WORK.” She answered and he sighed dramatically.

“Always business with you, alright, how soon can you get to the shop?” he asked, dropping the friendly tone entirely. Fujin immediately seemed more comfortable. 

“FREE.” she answers after a quick look in Squall’s direction.

“Good, I’ll be looking for you at around seventeen then.” Before he could hang up, Fujin made a noise that gave him pause.

“ANOTHER, TOGETHER.” she added. He was silent for a beat.

“You’re bringing someone else? Do they have any experience gardening?” He asked with a careful tone.

“YES.” It was Venta’s turn to make an interested noise and then hang up. Fujin went to her bag, opened it and made a few choice selections, adjusting her tactical harness and rifling through her identification, she paused tapping a card and looked back at Squall.

“NAME?” she ventured, Squall, put on the spot, rapid fired through a number of names he’d heard in the past rejecting each of them in turn before blurting out the first one he felt comfortable with.

“Uh, Vincent.” Fujin nodded sharply and hooked a thumb at herself with a questioning expression.

“Lee, if it’s the same one you gave the guy I presume is the landlord?” She nodded. 

“DELING.” Squall nodded comprehendingly. The two of them left the apartment, locking it, bringing only what they needed with them. 

\------------------------

By mutual agreement they stopped into a convenience store on the way across town, already pushing nine o’clock, hopping off a free public bus. They had been taking a circuitous route through the city. Fujin quietly pointing out landmarks and streets. They had picked up a town map from a shop when Squall had mentioned feeling hungry she had gotten a look and hopped off the bus. Fujin beelined through the shop to the refrigerated cases, opening it and pulling out a can then pointing toward the row. She’d indicated a row of what looked to be meal replacements in a can, some kind of vitamin drink. The one she selected looked to be some sort of berry flavor, after a brief examination and a tentative look at the selection chose something called Grandidi Dew, hopefully something named after a forest would be mild enough. Squall ended up paying for them, finding them humorously low priced. Fujin’s was open before she left the store and had taken a long pull, as she watched him out of the corner of her eye.

Squall tentatively opened his and would describe the bouquet of the thing he held as radioactive. His first sip made him pull back with shock. The drink was thick like a slushie, the flavoring agents were artificial, entirely so. Some kind of near-citrus flavor combined with a cloying amount of sugar and judging by the buzzing on his tongue it was fairly acidic. The only real world analogue he could conceive of was that it tasted the way licking a battery felt. 

“Eugh!? What!?” Squall grunted rubbing his tongue across the roof of his mouth

Committing to drinking the thing he spent money on he pulled back the can and looked at the nutrition information to try to convince himself it was a good idea. It was very nutritious. He’d seen meal replacement bars with less protein and carbohydrates. It had everything a worker would probably need for a moderate day of labor. The enormity of the resealable can suddenly made sense. Twenty ounces, he took a second sip. It was not as shocking now he knew what to expect. The drink rolled over his tongue, cloying and heavy. It was almost soothing going down his throat while cold. His stomach didn’t quite know what to do with it. It settled better with the third sip. 

“BETTER?” Fujin asked, sipping more at the drink. Watching him with undisguised interest.

“It’s…. Not as horrible as the first time.” he says mumbling into the can. He pulled the can back and looked at the ingredients. Hyne almighty, that's a lot of caffeine. Looking down the list, that was a tremendous amount of vitamin B as well. He took another sip.

“It’s offensive.” He mutters, but yet. He took another sip, despite himself. Somehow, the cloying sweetness, the sharp electric acidic flavor, the thickness. It… works.

He takes another sip, a frown on his face, and yet, he can’t stop.

\--------------------

Fujin guided them unerringly through the city, his brief foray into Deling previously had given him a false impression of the place. With grey clouds hanging close, and a light rain drizzling constantly down over them, it leant a sinister cast to the city even without the sorceress looming over it like a titan. There was a hostile quality to the streets themselves, empty of people even this early in the day around fourteen hundred, they had stopped at a small cafe and spent money on finger food for lunch. Something Squall appreciated, that strange thick drink had never quite settled right and left him feeling jittery and off kilter the whole morning . They moved quickly through the nicer neighborhood the destination was located in. They moved slower in this part of town. The one place he already knew was the space around the central park and the arc. She hadn’t asked questions, just pointed and questioned what he knew. Important people lived in this part of town and it showed. The buildings had small yards and stone walls, the windows were thin and tall, every building a fortress of the elite. Walking the streets had its own kind of hazard around here, in the form of honest to god military presence. Keeping their eyes ahead past the soldiers in the street on patrol. They barely received a glance as they went for the first hour, but as time crept by they started to draw more and more eyes. Luckily time had not stopped and the time for their appointment had approached. Little by little Squall found himself mimicking the half hunched look of the people he was modeled after. Fujin’s head wrap took on a new practical angle as they traveled and Squall wondered about investing in a hat. 

Before too long they had slipped into an unassuming stand alone shop bearing a familiar name at around seventeen hundred the end of the business day and the dark grey sky slowly sinking toward black. Fujin forestalled the young woman at the counter with a glance and Squall rode her wake into the rear of the shop. Flowers in various arrangements and chilling rooms filled the space by and large. However a heavy wood door labeled unassuming ‘Office’ was Fujin’s goal. She paused outside it so smoothly Squall nearly collided with her. She knocked firmly twice and then waited. Squall sunk back into a rest as he took in the back, a side door, the way back out, pruning implements and potted plants under growing lamps dominated much of the space. It was about a minute by Squall’s reckoning when the door opened and a thin face with strong cheekbones and square glasses perched on an imperial looking nose opened the door. 

“Ah, Lee, and associate.” Venta said, sizing up both of them from behind the door which he pushed open. 

“VINCENT.” Fujin corrected, Venta nodded and pulled back. It was at least two inches thick and as they walked through and Squall pulled it closed it was quite heavy as well. 

“Vincent then.” he allowed as he walked to a fine wooden desk stacked with papers and sat down. 

“I was hoping I would get your attention. I have a particularly stubborn bit of business, and was hoping to have it resolved quickly.” Venta said picking through a number of folders on his desk. He slipped one out with delicate, fine boned fingers and opened it smoothly. Squall stood by watching the interplay, Fujin remained standing despite a wooden chair being available so he stood as well. 

“Here… yes.” Venta slid a photograph out of the folder and across the desk. Fujin stepped up and picked up the photo, Squall leaned over her shoulder to get a look at the person. It was taken from a distance with a telephoto lens, probably unaware. A young-ish woman with hair in braids of many sizes held back behind her head and a wild look in her eyes.

“BRAIDS.” Fujin says simply, Squall glances at her as Venta nods.

“You’ve heard of her. Wild card that’s finally found its suit.” the hawkish man intones with venom.

“About twelve followers, word is they’ve acquired a benefactor somewhere in the city.” Venta intoned venomously. 

“And rumor has it Braids herself has been seen performing feats that are, in a word, unnatural.” Venta’s words made Squall bristle. There was possibility in those words, and he was fairly keen to find the bottom of them. Luckily it seemed like Fujin was already inclined toward this guy so he could stay silent. She spoke up then.

“FIFTY.” Venta shocked back a bit. 

“Thirty-five, not a coin more.” He tapped loudly on the table. Fujin rubbed the picture with her thumb and looked at Squall for the first time since they’d walked in. He kept his face carefully neutral. She loudly snorted.

“RISK. FORTY-ONE.” She declared, throwing the picture back down on the table. Venta leaned back in his chair and looked from Fujin to Squall. He met the man’s gaze without issue. 

“...Fine, but if any of them get away consider this the end of our relationship.” Venta said slamming closed the file and sliding it across the table. 

“I have business far beyond botanicals to run and I will not have some cheese-brained upstart roughing up my associates.” Venta said, pulling up a piece of paper and scribbling chicken scratch shorthand all over it. Fujin tucked the folder under her arm and nodded to Venta who scowled.

“You and Vinny here better produce results.” Venta spent more of his time eyeing Squall now. 

“TIMEFRAME?” Fujin queried, Venta’s eyes slid off Squall and he chewed on it a moment.

“A week, I have some important work that needs to be absolutely secure and those thugs absolutely can’t threaten it.” The man said putting his hands on the table setting the folder back down and spreading out the pictures and pages the briefing was fixing to last a bit longer than that. Squall took it upon himself to listen at least as closely as Fujin to learning about the person who they were supposed to murder.

As the door closed behind them Fujin huffed, and swatted Squall in the chest with the folder. Opening it he started pursuing the notes he had written, a few addresses, some names and a number of fairly blurry pictures depicting a group of individuals. A lot of the information was fairly useless. Not too unusual, not the mission he’d have picked given the option all told. 

“Looks like trouble.” He said simply enough. Fujin rolled her eye. 

“KNOW.” she said catching his eye. 

“You know Braids?” he asked speculatively. Fujin nodded slightly, looking unimpressed.

“Well then let’s go knock this out.” he said closing the largely uninformative folder.

“COMPLEX.” Fujin commented, sounding annoyed. Squall snorted derisively.

“Figures. Whatever, the day is falling off anyway.” He says scratching the back of his neck. Fujin exaggerated a waver on her feet as well. Squall chuckled at her acting as they headed toward the street, Squall fell in behind her as they waited for the bus together. 

One thing Deling had for it was top notch public transit at least. The bus arrived within 10 minutes despite the very late hour and they were on the way back to her apartment. The buses are largely empty but the two of them still sit beside each other, less than an inch apart. When the bus turns they brush against each other. Fujin holds herself unnaturally stiff, Squall leans his elbows down on his knees letting his head droop. He can read in her that she’s just as tired as he is, though she carries it with a paranoid vigilance while his mind wanders some. Within him the voices of the guardians roil, wordless pressure reaching out to the environment.

“It’s been a long day.”Squall said softly, his voice rising and falling with his breathing as he talked straight down into the floor of the bus.

“SAT.” Fujin added with a momentary sag.

“I wish I’d been able to sleep.” Squall admitted.

“DID.” Fujin said turning her head slightly to regard him and he lifted his head with a confused face.

“Huh.” was all he managed, She got a small smirk and exhaled out her nose.

The spoken conversation died there. But small movements and the folder moving slightly back and forth from one of them to the other continued it. Admissions of exhaustion, a question about stopping for real food, then finally the last few blocks walk to the apartment complex where they entered past the empty stoop. The halls were much more quiet, the voices lower.

The presence of the whole building was quieter. As Fujin unlocked the door a glass shattered against the wall of the apartment next door and there was a small shriek that immediately went silent. After a shared glance they walked inside the apartment. Squall pulled off his jacket and sheath and immediately straightened just slightly as he set it down against the wall with his bag.

Fujin began peeling off her outer layers leaving her in a white undershirt as she paused in the doorway, going ramrod stiff. Squall walked up behind her, his footsteps unnaturally loud in the relative silence of night. He looked over her shoulder hesitantly.

“What?” He asked softly. She jumped a little bit and walked into the room, undoing her belt and tossing it along with her other clothes into a small pile near the wall. He realized he had not seen the bedroom, it was as spartan as the rest of the house. Inside was a double bed with a fitted sheet left on it, the comforter and top sheet left hanging from a long line strung across the room. She pulled them down and cast them casually over the bed. In the corner of the room under the window was a collection of various sized buckets of different diameter and depth as well as a collection of sticks poking out of them. A closet stood open with a collection of clothes in it, not terribly dissimilar to what she wore now in more colors. At the back corner he saw the sleeve of a familiar jacket. 

Only one bed, and not a big one. He’d never shared a bed with anyone before, people had some pretty interesting ideas about what he and Rinoa’s relationship had been like but she had insisted they were too young to be getting physically involved. He hadn’t argued. That was how many things in that relationship had gone, Rinoa had made a declaration and he hadn’t argued. 

He loosened his belt and sat down next to his bag with his legs fully stretched out. His head made a thumping noise when it touched the wall. He’d let Fujin have the first shower and the bed, it was her apartment. He’d slept in worse positions. Fujin walked past him with a towel in her arms and threw it at him before taking the one under it into the shower with her. He snorted in amusement as he heard the water start through the thin walls. He closed his eyes and relaxed his body part by part. It was an old exercise. He’d mastered it many years ago and it helped him sleep. Apparently he’d slept on the transport from Timber. That had surprised him judging by how he felt at the end of it. 

Fujin’s shower lasted a while, he couldn’t blame her, he felt pretty grimey himself, even though he didn’t have clean clothes to change into. He’d have to wash some in the shower. He had a laundry bar tucked in the bottom of his bag for just such needs. When she came out wrapped up in her towel and only mostly damp instead of dripping he kept his head turned until she made it into her bedroom and walked into the bathroom with his shirts and one pair of pants. He took a long shower, not just for himself, he had a lot less hair now but he felt the need to get the spaces between his toes and scrub his legs. 

He sang quietly to himself as the water fell, a habit from long before he was commander. It was soothing to him, he knew privately that he was at least somewhat good at it, Rinoa had told him as much. However he was still fairly shy about the talent. It was something he personally liked, not a talent to spread around. The air in the city left him feeling gritty and it was just unacceptable. Eventually though he had to get out of the warm water. He took the time to give his clothes a wash, hanging them up in the open tile of the bathroom wherever he could to dry after wringing them out as best he could. 

He put on his other pair of jeans. Without his boots on he walked out into the chilly apartment and shivered lightly before adjusting his junction and banishing the chill. He looked over at the open bedroom door where Fujin walked about hurling her towel out of the bedroom to smack wetly in the middle of the floor. He let out a sharp huff of laughter at her cavalier treatment of the apartment. After a minute or so of walking around her bedroom Fujin’s head poked out with just slightly damp hair. 

“BED.” she said one hand on the doorframe looking at him meaningfully. 

“It’s yours I’ll be fine.” he said resting shirtless against the wall, his legs at full extension. She looked over him a moment then walked out, she was wearing a very oversized t-shirt that may as well have been a dress on her. It had the logo for what Squall imagined was probably a band on it.

“Where did you get a shirt that big?” he asked, unable to contain his curiosity. She grabbed it between her fingers, tugging it away from herself to look at it.

“CONCERT.” she said casually letting it drop again, turning her face back to him to catch him looking at her legs. She wiggled her toes self-consciously.

“WHAT?” jolting Squall out of his reverie.

“Oh, you don’t shave your legs.” he said distantly. Fujin did not blush, she refused to. It was just a casual observation. And furthermore, why should she, she preferred pants anyway, as long as everything was neat, what was the issue. She noticed she was staring at her own legs and looked up to find Squall looking her in the eye.

“FLOOR?” she asked, rising back to her usual straight posture.

“I’ll be fine, I’ve slept worse places than smooth wood.” Fujin could concede that, they both had. She found her eyes wandering down to his bare chest and shoulders. He didn’t even have gooseflesh, after a moment’s consideration she realized that he probably had adjusted his junctions to resist the chill of the lacking insulation. She was also quietly impressed by his fighter’s physique. He wasn’t some toned out body builder but he was solidly built, a warrior, a light amount of fat softened his lines and gave him a solidity that others lacked. Catching herself admiring made her feel worse about taking the only bed, they’d both lived hard lives and deserved comfort where they could find it. If she’d have considered she might have a guest she’d have gotten a bedroll at a surplus shop. Making up her mind she walks over and grabs Squall by the shoulder; pulling him to his feet. He makes a squawk-like noise of protest as she starts hauling him toward the bed. After stumbling he followed sedately enough, a frown on his face but his mouth closed. Standing him in front of the bed she stepped back and with both hands shoved him onto the bed.

“Fujin, I’m not…” he started as she walked around the other side of the bed and pulled back the covers and climbed in without a word. He awkwardly shifted, laying on top of the comforter a moment before she started jerking it out from under him until he stood up and she folded back the sheets and comforter before pointing firmly at the bed. Squall, yet again, didn’t argue. He pulled the covers over his jeans until it was up to his shoulders. And laid his hands out from his body, his legs just slightly apart. It was a little odd, probably, but he found it comfortable. Fujin, in a moment of scurrying movement turned off the lights of the apartment and then slid back into bed with a huff. Pulling the covers up to her shoulder she hunched onto her side and curled just a little. Her arms wrapped around the pillow. 

Squall lay in the darkness, his eyes closed and considered the day and everything that had happened. He slipped in and out of consciousness. Every time there was some sound outside the window, the phantom feeling of touch against his hand, soft crying through the walls, boots on wood, a distant siren, he would rouse, half awake and drift for some amount of time. There was no clock, so he couldn’t be sure how long. He found himself frequently looking over at Fujin, or rather, the top of her head, her face having slowly migrated under the covers. She moved a lot in her sleep he’d noticed on the carrier, and here. She was restless, seemingly all the time no matter how still she stayed still when she was awake. 

He wondered if she was just used to it all. He considered her strength. All the hidden parts of her she’d been so careful to conceal behind a solid front. He’d come to see through much of it. She was much as expressive as others, but she showed it very differently. Or rather, she concealed everything but the darker emotions, pleasure, embarrassment, shyness. They all hid behind an outward show of anger and stoicism. He could understand that feeling, hell he could empathize. He’d only spent how long pretending to be as cold as the tiles he walked on day after day in Garden? 

The longer he was around her though, the more he realized what a liar she was. And how interesting it made her. As he learned her tells, and how to read her very unique nonverbal language, he recognized something in it all. He wouldn’t put a name to it, but his reclaimed memories had shown him where it came from for him. It had let him slip free of his isolation. He could thank Rinoa for that at least. Getting him to recognize his own trauma and how deeply, darkly lonely he had been; pretending he needed no one. He faded out of consciousness, falling into a fitful sleep, dreaming of faces fading away into dark. 

Fujin would wake up whenever she felt Squall tense. It transferred through the bed to her. She hadn’t shared a bed with anyone since... Since she couldn’t remember, ever maybe. Her spine would tingle as she felt him turn his head. He took up a little more than half the bed. She was precisely aware of the position of him in the dark because when she shifted in her sleep and touched him she would start awake and pull away, waking him and she would just have to pretend to be asleep until his breathing evened back out and she could relax. 

She didn’t know why she kept slowly inching toward him, but it kept happening and it was extremely mortifying to keep waking him up when the hot ghost of his fingers brushed her. It wasn’t always her fault but it gave her sleep addled mind time to consider. To think why she’d been so eager to do this. Was it a desire for some kind of reclamation? Just wanting to be doing something? Was it that she wanted someone to follow again? No. There was something else. She couldn’t put her finger on it. She cared about it all. It wasn’t just that it was what she had dedicated more than half her life to Garden. It was a deep thought. And an uncomfortable one. Deeply, somewhere inside her a voice whispered, you’re tired of being a useless little girl.

Fujin squeezed her eye shut, the empty socket buried against the pillow burned like a brand and she finally gave up and focused inward, putting herself to sleep magically, just to stay asleep. To please stop thinking.

Sometime, when the window was still dark, Squall's eyes opened again. But he felt different. Warm, almost floating. He looked blurrily around the apartment seeing nothing amiss, but then felt something warm blow against his shoulder and looked down to see that Fujin had turned and was laying over his arm, her cheek resting on his chest. The shock of her hair obstructing his view of her entirely. He could feel that she had lain across his leg, still curled nearly in half, her face was blazing hot against his skin and her every breath sent a gentle tickle across his stomach. He paused, the ghost of a frown on his face, he lay his head back down and closed his eyes. He would decide how he felt about this in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another chapter finished, a little shorter, lighter on plot than I'd perhaps planned, but I wanted to do a little more interaction before we get back to the action. Maybe not what people want. but it felt important and you get a little sweetness at the end, so I hope you all enjoy.


	10. Cold Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The work is dirty as the city air. But there is light between the droplets. Small moments of warmth as circumstances push emotions higher. Hard cases showing cracks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [do be cautious, the violence is about to get very real and the last fight in this chapter is pretty graphic. Viewer discretion advised. we earn that M today.]

The sun just colored the horizon when Fujin’s eye opened. Her mind was fuzzy but her cheek was not resting on cloth. That cleared her mind in an instant. Her eye slowly roved up the largely bare chest her slightly sweaty cheek was pasted against. Squall appeared to still be asleep, she weighed the pros and cons of moving and potentially waking him. Provided he wasn’t already awake and just had his eyes closed. 

She cursed herself for using magic as a sleep aid. He was quite pleasantly warm, which made her realize she had half crawled on top of him and she felt the flush slowly rising up her neck and into her face. She took a deep breath and considered. 

No, it wasn’t shameful, she shouldn’t be ashamed. She was always cold when she slept and the last time she slept in the same bed as someone else… Her mind drew half a blank, a dim shadowy memory of someone much larger than her in a small bed with her. 

The memory pulled her face into a scowl and she slowly lifted her cheek.

“So you are awake.” Squall said and she jumped a little the flush shooting back full force, she kept her eye toward the foot of the bed.

“SORRY.” she said impulsively, her lips pressing together as she said it, her cheek pulling away from him, leaving him feeling cool with the absence.

“...I’m not upset.” he said, still laying on his back.

“ACCUSTOMED?” she asked him, suddenly curious.

“...no. People… had some weird ideas about Rinoa and I… We had separate quarters.” he explained, he wasn’t quite sure why he was feeling so defensive about it.

“...BEFORE?” she asked and he looked over at her.

“I barely spoke unless spoken to.” He said and she chewed on that a moment before nodding.

“FAIR.” she says and they settle into a mutually contemplative silence. 

“Did...” Squall started and then stopped. Fujin turned toward him, her mouth in a tight line. He looked her in the eye for a moment... then brought up a hand to rub his nose.

“Nevermi—” Squall muttered, looking away just as Fujin began to speak.

“No. I—” But Fujin stopped when he started. 

“I never… um, dated.” she admitted. Squall mulled over that admission.

“ I thought S—...” he started and she let out a sound that was one part snort, one part gag, and one part laugh. It was a sharp sound and Squall found himself slightly embarrassed. There were several beats of silence as Squall got over the feeling and Fujin almost seemed lost in thought.

“I never... I wasn’t… They never, the other students… They always looked at me, just stared at the... It was easier when they were  _ afraid _ instead.“ she seemed like she couldn’t really get the words out, Squall listened intently, as her fingers came up to touch her left cheek, her jaw so tight he could almost hear her teeth grinding. 

“You don’t…” Squall’s voice was small, hesitating. There was a softness of the quiet air, the gloom hung heavy in the dark city. 

Fujin firmed a little and turned her eye back to look at Squall without turning her head, concealing her blind side from him. Even in the dark her pale skin and hair almost glowed. They breathed in the moment before she spoke again.

“I couldn’t, or…” she started, searching for the words, slowly gathering them together. 

“I didn’t really know how to talk to anyone. Couldn’t really, it… It felt dangerous. Like, it wasn’t something I was supposed to do.” She said her gaze slowly falling down to the comforter, then her own hand as she pinched a bit of it in her fingers and rubbed slow circles. 

“I think I might know.” Squall said, and she rallied on it glancing back at him for an instant going silent, he continued as she sat a little straighter, regaining some of her hardness in silence.

“Or, understand? kind of.” Squall’s words shook Fujin and she glared at him, her spine tightening then it slumped and her head bowed, chin touching her collarbone then her face rose a little and she spoke again. The pre-dawn hush settling over them like new fallen ash, quieting everything but their voices.

“There wasn’t anybody… I could  _ trust _ who wouldn’t… didn’t….” She said in barely a whisper. Squall felt his throat close up a little at the pain in her words. They were like a razor she was drawing across her own face. They sat like that. Poised on the edge of something until Squall made a decision. He reached out, slowly, hesitating as Fujin hesitated. Then he grasped her wrist. His palm was hot against her skin. His grip was firm, but not painful. Her hand curled into a fist, tightening until it shook with tension then relaxed. She turned her head away and to his private shock, she kept talking.

“Seifer… He wasn’t afraid. And he didn’t pity me. Or make fun of me. He made me feel strong, like he was strong. He taught me to be strong. Even if I couldn’t… couldn’t, couldn’t,  _ say _ it, I could still  _ be _ it. And then he fought with you, chose  _ you _ . That stupid feud over and over. I… I...” She bit out. He saw tiny flickers of motion past her chin, little drops falling away. The pride, the anger, and also just a bit of weary, deep despair. She reached her hand across and grabbed his hand with her other one. There was something desperate in that grasp. Squall’s mouth was open before he knew what he wanted to say, something to match. 

There wasn’t anything though. His loneliness had all been his own fault; he remembered how many people who’d reached out to him whom he’d spurned, he’d chosen to shut people out. And after he remembered why, it only made him feel more like a fool. A child’s decision, and a petty reason that he had unknowingly clung to for a decade.

“Seifer, We.” he started and stopped as her breathing hitched and held. Her breath coming in short gasps of strenuously held composure that deepened toward more normal breaths only slowly.

“We grew up together.” Squall admitted and Fujin’s head turned, looking at him disbelieving through gritted teeth.

“We went to the same Orphanage. After the first war.” he felt like he was catching up to his own words only after they came out of his mouth.

“I had, he was, Seifer was always kind of like a bully. I think. I remember, patches, flashes of it. I visited the Orphanage, again, during the war. We, by accident, kind of went back. All of us had been together. When I say we, I mean Trepe, Tilmett, Dincht, Kinneas, Seifer, and I.” Squall found himself explaining. Fujin’s mouth fell open, the anger of her confessions lost as his story continued.

“It belonged to the Kramers, Cid and Edea were… well I guess they still are Married…” Fujin let go of his hand to point at him.

“WAIT.” she said holding up a finger warningly, and the words caught in his mouth with a questioning look on his face it took several breaths before she continued..

“You’re telling me, Literally three quarters of the major players in the second sorceress war were all from one orphanage. Where you all grew up together? And forget about it!?” she said glaring at him in stark disbelief.

“Yes.” Squall said, looking uncertain.

“And what, lemme guess, you’re royalty, wait, no, Rinoa was royalty!” She said stabbing her finger at him.

“Uh, no. Though she was going by princess as a handle... Her father is Fury Caraway…” Fujin’s face fell.

“Fury Caraway’s  _ daughter _ . The estranged one? That ran away from home at sixteen with nearly three million Gil stolen from her father.” Fujin said in a tone that expressed how little she was willing to believe this revelation.

“yeah, and she started a resistance group in Timber that hired us right after the exams.” Squall continued.

“No, that’s too much coincidence. You’re pulling my leg. BULLSHIT.” she said, shaking her head.

“It’s the truth. It’s… well there’s a bigger story.” He said, sitting back up. They sat in silence, each of them thinking for at least thirty seconds..

“Well, I’m awake now. I don’t remember you having any good breakfast food in the fridge. I’ll be back.” Squall said swinging his feet over the edge. Neither of them could really look the other in the face. They’d both revealed themselves somewhat. Squall still felt like he’d badly intruded but Fujin felt both mortified at how much she’d said but lighter at having said it. 

Her face was buzzing with painful static from trying not to cry though it was fading now and she needed to chase it away with some hot water so she waited for him to dress from his bag while she walked past him into the bathroom and turned the spigot to wait for the water to get hot. She heard him leave and leaned heavily on the sink with a deep sigh. She’d just woken up and she already felt tired. 

She scrubbed her face with her hands pushing away the last vestiges of the outpouring not five minutes before with her thoughts hanging toward what lay ahead. The work waits.

\---------------------------------

The quick sounds of boots on wet pavement, furious staccato stabbing into the night of Deling. He’d abandoned his jacket two blocks back. The fire that had exploded against his back had consumed it in seconds even despite the steady rain. Timner’s ears strained hoping to hear the sound of the boots behind him, at least he’d know where they were. His heart was pounding in his ears, it was all he could hear past the gasping ragged breaths. Every intake burned with the taste of ash and every exhale rose with bile burning his throat. It was shockingly painful to even breath the feeling of being unable to even possibly get enough air. He knew he couldn’t stop, Semma had stopped. She’d stumbled, paused, looking back over her shoulder up the empty street. 

He’d watched as she leaned against the corner one hand on the brick, one on her knee. A flicker of steel and her head was gone. The goddamn monster standing over her had dropped from the roof like a goddamn thrustaevis. 

Then those eyes had turned on him. It dressed like him, but if he’d dropped from that roof three stories up he’d have broken both legs. Those eyes though, they weren’t human. Blue, like treated metal, like hard light through morning fog, like antifreeze not a single thought or flicker of a soul in the second their eyes locked. The blood didn’t even have time to drip it just gushed as the body dropped to the floor, and Semma became a was. 

Timner knew he couldn’t stop. He just ran, he needed to lose that thing. He had to get out of Deling, out of Galbadia. No matter what shape they wore they weren't people. Monsters that looked like people. No, SeeD. Had to be, Braids had enemies, lots of them. None of them could afford SeeD. He turned into an alley cutting from Tremalia street to Capatian. Running past bags of garbage overflowing from a dumpster, he nearly slipped in an oily pool along the side of an old model car. He tried to keep to the alleys they were familiar, he’d lived his whole life in them it felt like. Even now they tried to help him, afterall there were only two places they could come from then. 

He chanced a glance over his shoulder and caught a flicker of movement. It was all he needed to keep moving. His legs burned. His lungs were full of ash and fire, tiny knives in every breath. He slid into another alley, just a short dead end. The irony wasn’t lost on him as he quickly made a decision. He pulled up the lid of a dumpster and threw himself inside as the lid juddered against the metal as it slammed back into place. Liquid sloshed along the bottom, just a quarter inch deep of swill. The smell was indescribable, filth ridden sludge that burned almost worse than the pain of the air. Thick with corruption and the gentle buzzing of newborn flies. His well worn work boots kept it out but he could still feel the maggots writhe around his toes in his imagination. 

Stopping moving only made breathing harder, his vision swam, his hands trembled but he kept his mouth shut, listening to the gentle patter of the rain that hid nearly everything. Muffled sound forced him to hold his breath for just a second to try to hear something besides his own painful gasps and then he heard it. Boots on stone. A tiny sound, tinny, metal on stone, just a tap then it got closer. He put his hands over his mouth and nose trying so hard to not make a single sound even as his brain screamed for oxygen. His vision black around the edges narrowing to just a tiny slit of light where plastic met metal. 

The tears came next. He couldn’t help it. He’d promised his mother he’d stop crying, but like every other little thing in his life. He lied. He wasn’t anybody, he could be honest with himself now. He promised Hyne, Edea, anybody who would listen and save him. If he could survive this alley he’d never touch another bottle, another gun, another needle, another pill, or another knife but to make something of worth. If only he could live, ANYONE? 

“Come out.” the voice commanded. A shiver went down his spine and a sob broke through his hands no matter how hard he tried to hold it in. The voice was from right outside the dumpster. He fell to his knees with a long sound that might have been a laugh, might have been a cry he certainly couldn’t tell anymore. 

“Come out, now.” The voice repeated. Timner looked up at the tiny sliver of light coming between the top of the dumpster and the plastic lid, willing the person to just go away to leave him to the writhing filth soaking through the knees of his pants. The icy water running down his spine from his soaked shirt brough shivers but they magnified well past the cold. His every fiber screaming out contradicting messages, run and fight, unable to do either he did the only thing he could and he sat trembling through the hitching breaths and the hands in front of his mouth frozen, eyes wide as they could be, seeing almost nothing.

He couldn’t keep his eyes open, he was going to die here. In an alley. Just like his father told him. You’re going to die son, like a dog in the dark! Those words had pushed him so hard, to be somebody. Something cold and silver slipped along the edge of the dumpster above him and he scrambled away from it as the tip of the blade pressed the lid up to the wall, he looked up at the dark clouds framed by the stained brick of the buildings around him but his eyes inevitably moved to the hand that held the massive blade like it weighed nothing. The clouds swirled and shifted and the rain fell on him again mixing with tears and snot. 

It was breathtakingly beautiful at that moment. He couldn’t imagine why he’d never just looked up into the rain. He had always had his head turned down, to the street, to the ground. Then his eyes returned to the sword blade, no, gunblade. It pinned the lid against the wall with delicate pressure, enough to raise it and hold it, but not enough to pierce it. The top of a face looked over the lip of the dumpster. Those eyes, the same ones that watched Semma slump to the concrete without any feeling, no heat, no fury, no pleasure, no pain. Blue, but gray, colder than the rain, colder than the night, like pools of tainted nothing. They looked right through him like he wasn’t even there, like he wasn’t even human.

“Out.” the voice commanded, and Timner fell back, the vile fluid in the dumpster soaking into his pants and his shirt. He held up his hands, half curled into claws, as though with bare hands he could do what he couldn’t have done with a gun, with a blade. He didn’t blink even as water hit his lashes he couldn’t close them. Couldn’t look away.

“Please!” he gasped. His voice sounded so small, so high. He was only twenty three years old. A hand on the lip of the dumpster and the man lifted himself, planting his boots on the lip in a crouch like a terrible gargoyle, the sliver of his blade resting on his shoulder now. No, not a gargoyle, his face was too beautiful, too clean. He was an angel, or maybe a devil.

“Please~! Please… please… ” Timner gasped the word broken by his sobs as he held up his hands. He knew it was futile. SeeD could cut through a tank with a normal sword. They didn’t bleed, they didn’t feel anything at all. Even magic bounced off them. They were invincible, unstoppable. He’d never believed. He’d heard and laughed. Now, with one standing over him, he laughed again. But it wasn’t funny. He squeezed his eyes shut as he added to the fluids in the dumpster. What use was dignity? You couldn’t stop a bullet with it, couldn’t stop a blade with it. 

“It’s too late for that.” The SeeD said so calmly. Somewhere close, something moves so fast, it whistles. And now Timner was.

  
  


\-------------------

  
  


“FOUND?” Fujin asked as she climbed in the window of the third floor apartment where Squall was already stepping out of a bedroom, closing the door behind him. She was soaked to the bone with the rain outside, but carried herself straight as always. He couldn’t imagine he looked much better. The blood on his boots slowly rolled off into the cheap wall to wall carpeting soaking in like it was thirsty. 

“They’re dead.” Squall answered, she nodded. There was nothing more to say, they took the window back out, dropping to the pavement from the third story without more than the tap of boots on concrete.. There were still two names left on their list: Chainer, and Braids. Over the last four days they had run this part of town a dozen times over, hunting. Luckily these last two, they weren’t hiding. Finding where they were was the easy part, Braids at least was known to have somewhere acquired a Junction. The others though. After the first three were put in the ground they scattered like rats. Finding them had taken days. Going to ground is a great plan unless your safe houses aren't something you put together on your own, and the two SeeD had been able to find them by talking to contractors. Loyalty bought with gil turned with the same.

Banding together, strength in numbers is usually a good idea as well. Unless you’re not fighting someone bullets and switchblades can stop. Five of them had been in one place after they’d pulled another out of his hole. Three died in less than a minute the last two ran and were run down. The sirens in the distance were growing louder. Cutting people down in the streets is not subtle, but the point of this mission was sending a message. Squall could read between the lines just as easily as Fujin. 

Squall carefully lifted the gunblade up and settled the tip on the sheath before sliding it away. He’d practiced the motion a hundred times, mostly to smooth the draw. But it was getting easier. He doubted it would ever be comfortable. His weapon was too long for that. But he was distracting himself from the job. 

“Just two.” Squall said walking out of the alley, Fujin watched him, falling in behind his left shoulder naturally. 

“BOTHERED.” Fujin said behind him. It wasn’t a question, he kept his eyes forward.

“Yeah.” He conceded. Fujin made a noise in her throat, but let it go. He knew there’d be more later. He heard her light the smoke before he smelled it. The breeze was never predictable in Deling, it whipped and wrapped around the buildings, pulling and pushing the rain and ash with it. The two of them passed others on the street. Despite the size of the city there were never many people on the streets, twelve hour work days and commutes from the inner city to the industrial zones ringing it took too much time for much of a crowd to build up. Deling embraced a six day work week, which six was pretty much by the job though from what he’d gathered listening to people when they stopped to eat. 

Food was pretty cheap outside the sit-down restaurants. Every third corner had something. Deling was a melting pot in many ways, stranded Estharians after the first war, Trabians escaping the tribal life, Balamb natives who got tired of seeing the sun. He chuckled darkly at his own joke and could feel Fujin’s eye on him. He made a small motion with one hand brushing it off near his waist and felt the pressure lessen. He felt a tap on his shoulder and turned his head toward Fujin only to be met by her hand holding out half a lit smoke.

“HELPS.” she said softly. He didn’t like the idea of embarrassing himself but he was already coughing from the damned ash all the time, what was the difference. He took a tentative pull and found it no less unpleasant than simply breathing in this town. The flavor was sharp and spicy coating his tongue with a tannin-like parched feeling that crept down his throat, burning then cooling. He coughed out most of the smoke, after a moment took another pull, deeper. He coughed a little but managed to more smoothly exhale the rest. He passed the short burning cigarette back. She took it without comment. He did feel something, like a fuzziness and a coolness that settled at the edges of his mind.

He admitted to himself that he was upset. When it had been during the war three short years ago, it had been easy to fight soldiers that stood in his way. It was what he had been trained for, and he had many excuses for himself. This felt less like fighting and more like murder. The terror he’d seen in that young man’s face made his skin crawl. The ones that tried to resist could barely break his skin. There was no contest, they had no chance. It wasn’t a fight. He set aside his distaste. There would be time later. It was late again, bodies left cooling in this dark hole of a city. His mouth was dry, he didn’t know if it was the smoke or just the foulness of his task. 

Squall could feel the anger welling up inside him. He sighed and his shoulders sagged for a moment, swallowing anger felt a lot like swallowing blood. A little was fine, too much and you’d just end up sick. Fujin tapped his shoulder again and he took the nearly burned out smoke and took another inhale before throwing it in a pool before the filter could catch. He let out the smoke in a long sigh.

“DONE.” she said and he glanced over his shoulder at her.

“FOR NIGHT.” she elaborated at his unspoken question. He hung his head a bit.

“We only have two days.” He said straightening his back some before ducking his head again against the wind.

“TIME UNIMPORTANT.” He half turned his head but conceded to her decision. She was in charge of this operation. He deliberately slowed to walk alongside her. She walked beside him in companionable silence. Shifting closer as they walked until they brushed each other as they headed back to the block her apartment was in.

\---------------------------

They sat on the floor in the apartment in silence. Squall looking at nothing, his face tight. Mouth just barely turned down. The dark maroon of his tank top shirt plastered to his flesh where the polluted rain of the city had dripped down his neck past his coat. One arm rested on his thigh, the other forearm rested on his raised knee. The ashtray rested between them on the floor, Fujin’s pack of smokes rested next to it, she pulled a little out of the one that was lit in her fingers. 

“It feels different.” He said quietly, breaking the cool air of the apartment where they both sat dripping and drying, coats in the bath where they could drip dry. Fujin made a small noise, egging him on.

“I’ve only… the only missions I took were bigger, battles, wars. It’s different.” He repeated. Unable to put quite into words. He accepted the smoke when she passed it to him bringing it up to his lips as she spoke, filling the void.

“KILLING. MURDER.” She said after a moment’s consideration Squall leaned into his knee a bit with the word, turning his head away as if to protect it and blew out a breath of smoke in a long exhale punctuated by soft coughs.

“Yes…” he admitted. The admittance alone cost him something, turning his head to look at her he offered the smoke back, she took it but her hand lingered touching his for a moment. She had an intense look on her face, looking at him squarely. There was nothing accusatory, but seeking.

“KNOW.” she said her eye trailed down to his hand, he followed her gaze and made a fist for a moment.

“There’s two more of them.” he said to change the subject, uncomfortable with the intensity he could feel in the air.

“READY.” she added and he sighed, he wasn’t sure the smell of spicy smoke hovered between them clouding the air. He took a long moment thinking forward as she watched him out of the corner of her eye, fingers rolling the lit stick back and forth slowly.

“We’ll just have to stake that club she keeps showing up at. Seems kinda foolish to keep going to the same place.” He looked at her and she smirked and reached over to put the roll right in his lips, making a small noise of protest as she touched the side of his nose, then her own. The strange gesture brought a smirk to his face for a moment.

“BRAIDS. OVERCONFIDENT.” She explained, her own smile was predatory but also welcoming, beckoning almost for him to join her, which he did.

“Forces have a way of making you feel like that. But seriously, why a club?” he admitted.

“EXPERIENCE. FAMILIARITY.” She says leaning back against the wall, her head making a soft thump as it makes contact. Squall snorts a small plume of smoke out his nose and then starts coughing, passing her the cigarette with one hand while he coughs. Fujin lets out a soft laugh at his discomfort.

“That really hurts!” he gasps out through the fit.

“EXPERIENCE.” she says again and he glares at her past watering eyes. She answers back by blowing a plume of smoke out her nose. 

“Wh~ _ ack~ _ whatever.” He says as his face reddens and her laugh becomes a cackle, reaching over a hand to pat him on the back as he starts to be able to breath again. 

Fujin lets out a sigh, smiling and knocking the ash off the roll into the tray, bringing it to her lips and patting Squall on the knee condescendingly. 

Squall looked at her in profile a few moments then turned away closing his eyes and hiding a snort of laughter and a tight smile.

“WHAT?” she said looking back at him.

“You’re good company.” He said and she rolled the compliment around in her brain, her face falling flat for a moment before looking over at him questioningly.

“It’s true.” he said and she leaned her head toward him and raised her eyebrows.

“Fine, You don’t talk for no reason. Or expect me to say every damn thing on my mind.” He says scratching at his unshaven cheeks lending him a particularly trampish look.

“FACE.” she said and when his lack of understanding was apparent she raised a hand to motion to her own.

“THOUGHTS.” she explained and he nodded.

“You also think a lot more than some of them.” He added with her explanation, his face rocking between unamused at his memories and quite amused at her erudition.

“TILMETT.” Fujin said with mild distaste.

“She’s…. I honestly can’t tell if she never thinks or is secretly some kind of savant.” Squall says with tired honesty.

“SEXUAL HARASSMENT.” Fujin adds with a grimace.

“It was like a monthly thing with her… she couldn’t keep her opinions to herself.” Squall lets out a deep sigh and hangs his head.

“CAME ON.” Fujin said seriously looking at Squall who made a despairing noise.

“I believe it.” bringing a hand up to his face and closing his eyes.

“...FLATTERING.” Fujin added out of the side of her mouth pulling in a breath of smoke.

“...What did she do?” Squall asked looking over.

“CORNERED. SHOWER.” She explained. Squall looked uneasy.

“COMPLIMENTS…. OFFERED FRIENDSHIP.” Fujin chewed on the inside of her lip as she thought about it.

“... Yeah that sounds like Selphie.” Squall admitted stroking his face with one hand then rubbing his cheeks with his fingers.

“This feels so weird.” he said seemingly to himself.

“flashed.” Fujin confessed much more quietly.

“What? Did she…?” Squall asked and Fujin immediately regretted having said anything. 

“SELF. AFTER MISSION. PASSED OUT. ACCIDENT.” She said.

“Oh. Oops?” Squall uncertainty commented. Fujin shrugged helplessly, accepting her blunder.

“Well I guess that absolves Selphie a little.” Squall ventured to another shrug from Fujin. There were several seconds of silence before Fujin spoke up again, her tone questioning, one eyebrow rising.

“BEFORE?” She asked. Squall scratched his chin.

“Selphie is… Open about people she finds attractive.” Squall admitted hesitantly.

“OPEN?” Fujin said in a mocking tone.

“She can get… handsy… and we’ve had to talk about it before. And seems like we need to talk to her again.” Squall said with a bit of regret. He sighed and rubbed his face.

“IRRELEVANT.” She said waving a hand through the light haze of smoke that wreathed them. The still air of the room failed to disperse the smoke with any haste. The spicey cool flavor of the smoke lingering, hanging between them. 

“...I guess you’re right. It’s not my problem right now. Quistis can handle it.” Squall said more to himself than to Fujin. 

Fujin stared at the cigarette for a few moments before letting it rest limply in her lips, not really taking an interest in feeding her addiction in the moment. Squall was similarly lost in thought.

“It’s really hard to let go.” He said putting his hand over his eyes. Her eye slid over to him, without turning her head, then went back to staring into the middle distance.

“There’s so much less, it’s such… so… simple. Just you, me, a meal a day, and…  _ murder _ . I wasn’t ever really a normal SeeD, but I guess this is their life.” His words were heavy with some directionless resentment. 

“HERO.” she said and plucked the last centimeters of the smoke out of her mouth and held it up to his lips, forestalling any comment from him.

“I never felt like it.” he said sharply, snatching the cigarette out of his mouth and then putting it right back and taking a deep breath that left him coughing. They sat in silence as Squall viciously put out the smoldering butt with a thumb. Grinding the burning cherry carelessly against his skin. The flames left him untouched. 

“Everybody said it, you’re a hero, you’re a hero, Commander of SeeD, defeated the sorceresses, saved the world… got the girl... “ His smirk was humorless.

“Rinoa.” He said her name like a curse, but also like an appeal. He closed his eyes and his lips formed a thin line. His head shook back and forth slowly. 

“SORCERESS.” Fujin commented beside him.

“...I’m afraid, I guess.” He said opening his eyes to stare back at the wall. Fujin was silent and still beside him. He tried to borrow her firmness.

“...That I’m going to have to kill her.” He said. And just like that something he’d avoided saying for years was past his lips and he felt sick. He swallowed against the thick feeling in his throat. 

“She was already getting carried away, with the magic, with herself…” he continued as though trying to talk himself into it. 

“I really hope she just finds a quiet corner of the world and stays lost. Nobody’s heard a word from her in more than a year.” he said solidly, pulling his fingers into fists.

“LOVE?” Fujin asked the question and Squall’s head snapped around at her.

“Yes.” he answered automatically, then a shadow passed over his face. “Or, I think so. I care about her. I want her to be okay. But…” He started then let it drop. Fujin stayed still and quiet for a few minutes mulling over what he had said. Then she reached over and gently rested her hand on his forearm. He let his hands relax and let out a sigh.

“I don’t know anymore.” he admitted in a voice that was just thickening with pain. Fujin’s grip tightened and Squall fell silent a few heartbeats. Just as her fingers were about to loosen he spoke again.

“Looking back. There was just so much… Inertia. From the graduation ball, then the mission, and then everything just spiraled.” he started talking and despite Fujin’s fractionally tightened grip he kept talking as her eye widened slightly.

“I just never argued. I tried to ignore her and she pushed harder, I tried to hold her back and she pushed past me. In the end I just ended up following her. She initiated everything, every step of the... The relationship was her.” his words carried a certain bitterness.

“It felt so real, but I didn’t have to do anything. Just follow. After it was all over, I somehow guess I expected something to change. Like she would start listening to me like everyone else had.” he said bringing his other hand up to rub at his eyes with both of them. 

“I don’t know why I thought that.” The bitterness fermented into a kind of melancholy.

“She only got more willful, demanding. In Timber they called her Princess. I should have caught the warning.” his chuckle was without mirth. Fujin decided this was her moment and pressed her nails into his arm.

“Ow! Hey! What was that for?” he said snatching his arm away with a scowl.

“...” she didn’t say anything right away though it was clear from her expression she wanted to. The silence stretched for several seconds as Squall rubbed his uninjured arm. More surprised than hurt.

“Sorry.” he said quietly and her jaw worked for a moment, mulling something over.

“I don’t…” she started then lapsed back into silence. Squall put his hands on the ground and let the pregnant lull in the conversation gestate. Ten minutes passed while both of them considered all that had been said before Squall pushed up from the floor to his feet shakily. He turned around, standing over Fujin who looked up at him. Their eyes met and held for several seconds. 

“I don’t know what I feel about Rinoa.” Squall said in a voice that was quiet even in the stillness of the late night. A small motion offered out a hand to Fujin.

“I feel like I'm ready to sleep.” he said as she took his hand and pulled herself up with it. His eyes were already turning toward the bedroom they shared. It had been strange after that first morning. But neither of them had brought it up again. When Squall had tried to take the floor the next night Fujin had dragged him back into the bedroom and after that they had simply shared the bed. Often waking with Fujin’s head on his arm or chest. It was just how things were now. Easier to let them be. Especially when he couldn’t remember sleeping as easily.

\--------------------------

The rain had mostly abated by the time the clocks struck seventeen only a light drizzle still misted down upon the streets. The place they had headed was in the western part of the city, a fair distance from their flat. The sign was in neon and a far cry from the understated lounges of the city center. The music was audible through the walls as a dull thrum. It advertised a local disk jockey who was mixing for tonight, Live music every other day. Reputable places typically weren’t open 1600 to 0700. 

Fujin had changed her hair to a side-swept sheaf concealing her patch, head uncovered. Her boots rose to mid calf and buckled thrice up their sides. Her jacket was cropped with her gunblade and its accompanying belt fastened securely at her hip. She wore black gloves that matched coat, boots, and pants, her top jarringly white. Squall had chosen black pants as well, his same black combat boots, though his shirt had long sleeves, the cuffs of which poked from beneath his punk-ish jacket studded with glittering steel about the shoulders the buckles left unfastened on both the coat and over-shoulder holster for his blade. 

They approached the club together, nearly shoulder to shoulder, Squall hovering less than a step behind Fujin’s blind shoulder like a vicious shade. The Silver Star was a down-city club, the drinks were cheap, the music loud, and there was honest to god security. Fujin was at ease, as the bouncer stopped the two of them and directed them into the vestibule beyond. The space was like a coat check, only they were far more concerned with their guns. Both of them were scanned and turned over their weapons, receiving a marking and a chit to retrieve them. 

The music wasn’t just loud, the bass reverberated every time Squall filled his lungs with the ashen air, the scent of stale smoke and sweat beat the air filling his mouth. There was a frenetic energy to it. The sound hurt his ears, and made his chest ache with every pound of the bass. His frown deepened to a scowl. Fujin, like wind, seemed unbothered, the sound passing through her without even a change in her face. He envied her reserve for a moment before he noticed the way the pace of their movement changed. He would have slowed, but she sped, it took him a few seconds to realize that her steps matched the pace. 

The inside of the club had a low ceiling, the edges of the room were booths and tables crowded out of the way of a sunken pit at the center. There was almost no decoration, the ground was bare concrete in most places, stained in ways he couldn’t identify. There was almost no general lighting, small lamps rested on the tables along the rim. The rest of the room was in a sparkling shock of light and motion. Yellow spotlights on randomized pans flooding the place in short shots of illumination broken by low energy lasers and diffusers casting the whole place in a hellish red and blue. broken by the sharp white of a large ball at the center of the space that hovered and wandered casting brilliant white blades of light across the dance floor and all the way to the ceiling. The silver star, no doubt. 

Squall felt a tug on his sleeve and realized he’d been staring. He looked in the direction of the pull to find not Fujin but some other woman, she was shorter than him, her hair looked almost red in the haze. She opened her mouth and shouted over the din.

“Hey! Wanna dance with me!?” she shouted breathily, her clothes were a tattered pair of pants, nearly falling apart in fact. The roots of her dye job showing her darker natural hair-color. Her eyes were glassy, her breathing rapid despite standing still. 

His eyes roved quickly looking for the familiar shock of white. He couldn’t find her in the riotous gloom, a disconcerting feeling until he caught sight of her shock of stark silver hair ghosting by the bar. Fujin was prowling, checking the corners like he should be. 

He looked down at where the girl had a hand on his jacket and delicately reached out to take hold of her hand, pulling it off his sleeve and letting it go. He considered a moment, Fujin was searching the corners, that did leave the rather dense dance floor as a place where Braids or her second could be hiding out. He looked down at the opportunity this girl had created for him. He decided to take her suggestion but not her, and turned to head to the dance floor himself the woman nearly jumped to follow him, he could feel her bump into the back of his shoulder nearly making him stumble. 

“I knew you look’t like fun!” she said looking up at him with her honestly crazed looking expression with wide eyed possessiveness. This was unpleasant enough already without some girl attaching herself to him. He shifted through the dancing party. He moved smoothly enough though he really set himself apart by not really knowing what to do and ended up mimicking some of the other men on the floor. He suspected he was doing so fairly badly but the little leech didn’t mind. Once he’d set foot on the floor she was always trying to find a way to be rubbing against him. It was honestly disconcerting. The song changed and with it the pace of the dance. The colors shifted to a sharper red as the slightly slower tempo altered the pace of the dancers. Squall had his eyes open, looking for his targets. There was always the chance they were not here tonight, which would be annoying, they only had one more day. To play this game. He hoped Fujin was having more luck than he was as he felt the girl’s hands try to slide under his shirt and he had to stop her. It was going to be a long stake. 

\-----------------

Fujin had quickly made her way around the circumference of the room, she’d noticed about a minute later that Squall wasn’t with her, it wasn’t that shocking. She knew this club, and had spent a fair number of nights here trying to distract herself from other things. As she passed by, stalking out the tucked-away booths looking for her reason to come back to this place she spared a moment now and again to look for Squall, in the ocean of bodies, she spared a glance toward the entrance just in time to see ‘Vincent’ pull some rager’s hand off his sleeve. She continued on with her scout of the tables around the outside, it would only take a minute more and she would loop back around to him. 

He stuck out like a sore thumb. It brought a little smirk to her face. 

How to blend into a deling nightlife club wasn’t really on the SeeD curriculum. They were always more concerned with the ‘upper crust’ of society, their likely targets and benefactors. Working this low on the totem pole was fairly rare for Garden, but for her. Well, she wasn’t exactly new to this club. She had spent quite a few hours here trying to forget the rest of her job. It wasn’t the worst place to be. The live music was generally more her choice. 

Finishing her circuit without finding who she was looking for, just a few groups of friends, a girl plying a trade under the table, and a few people making deals, but nothing that would detain her for now. She turned back to find her partner having moved away from the door. She stalked back around the circumference of the room looking for him, the lights playing merry havoc with her ability to look for distinguishing features. She couldn’t imagine that he would slip back outside, it would be too obvious.

After a bit of consideration she figured he must have made his way down to the dance floor. Questionable as it was, she had been checking the booths and he would want to do the most effective thing he could be doing, and that was almost unquestionably searching the writhing mass of bodies on the recessed floor. The only thing left to do was descend herself to find him. They really probably should have made a more immediate plan to find each other. They had a meet back time in about an hour to compare notes, but that wouldn’t help her here. Nothing to do but pick up the beat and dance in to slide through and look for Vincent amongst the mass. 

It was almost easy to slide back into old patterns, like a well worn track. The music pounded, but the rhythm was easy to grasp and echoed, the feeling of the subwoofer caused a flutter as the air in her lungs pulsed in time. It was easy to lose yourself when all you can think is the track. 

She pushed deeper using the smooth sinuous motions of the dance to slither through. She couldn’t help but touch bodies in passing. Some reached back, fingers and arms ghosted against her. It was a disconcerting but rewarding feeling all the same, a reminder of presence and a feeling of belonging. She didn’t know these people but there was a shared grain amongst them all, a desire to escape. 

The light was disorienting, the sound omnipresent, the sea of bodies didn’t part easily and she found herself moving with them, unable to fight without breaking the tide. So she slowed down. Time seemed to swallow her whole as the music pounded and the lights coruscated. It was hard to focus on the faces. The shifting color and light made is hard to see detail. 

Somewhere in the twisting space she caught a glimpse of a familiar scar. She knew she couldn’t draw his attention without drawing everyone else’s, so she shifted her motion toward him slipping between people and following the ebb and flow of the song to slide up beside him. He did seem to have a problem. That rager from the door was practically trying to meld into him. Her hands on him no matter how many times he subtly brushed her off she seemed to not get the message, or deliberately ignored it. 

Fujin’s face twisted into a scowl and she slid up behind the handsy woman pressing her body against the girl’s back and reaching to tug at Vincent’s decorated shoulder his eyes slid down to her in instant recognition and the both glanced at the woman she had pinned to him. The girl had noticed the attention by now had despite the glassy look about her, she had gotten a more nervous cast to her smile. Her lips moved, but the sound was lost. It looked like a question. 

Fujin’s hand traced down the girl’s arm until it found her hand and Fujin grasped one of the girl’s fingers and started to twist it. The nervous look changed to a scared one and she looked up at Vincent for help only to see him look over her shoulder at her attacker with a grateful look. Fujin offered him a smile which he returned with a nod. Fujin’s grip on the girl’s finger tightened and started to twist a little more fiercely. The girl audibly yelped and tried to skirt her way out from between them. 

Fujin let her go, the two of them watched the girl go, an island of stillness in the writhing sea for a few seconds. Fujin stepped up to Vincent and he looked her in the eye questioningly as she slowly scanned the bodies around them. He considered her gesture for a moment then nodded and resumed looking around. She stayed close to him, they touched occasionally his movements were off tempo and awkward. She was more in tune with the music. Experience having taught her how to move in a group like this. It was almost amusing.

Though because of the disconnect they kept bumping into each other. It was distracting, and after the third time she snapped her hands out to grab him, drawing his attention and she placed her hands on his hip and shoulder making a motion with her head at the males around them. She danced with the music guiding him in a similar dance. He watched her, followed her examples with that intense focus she was coming to associate with any time he was trying to learn something new. He learned quickly, partially because he put his full attention on something when he needed to. Probably not the best for their current objective but if they were going to be in clubs like this for another day waiting out Braids then he should at least try to fit in. 

Working in the lowest rungs of society they were bound to end up in places like this again, to meet clients if for no other reason. Hyne knew she had. Leading him was easy and after the first few moves he seemed to get the idea moving more in tune, he didn’t seem to have an intuitive grasp of the sound yet, but looking around him more he settled, she drew his attention with a prodding finger and tapped her ear then her chest closing her eye a moment before sliding back into the dance. She turned her head and watched around them as he closed his eyes briefly, his motions getting a little wider without eyes open to judge them. 

Little lessons and moments as Squall learned how to dance to club music stuck out in Fujin’s mind as people came and went. They spent maybe an hour on the floor before sliding off of it as the music shifted. Both of them were sweating, not pouring sweat like some of the others, junction helped with handling the actual heat of that many bodies together, but the exertion of putting one’s whole body in motion wasn’t a small effort. Unfortunately it’s a club not exactly a restaurant so they had to make due with lightly alcoholic spritzers. She watched Squall as he drank; his face serious and his body tense. She was feeling pretty loose herself, honestly. It felt good to move, something more physical than cerebral. She found herself wishing that they were just here to dance. It was almost startling to realize she’d missed this sort of thing. It had been a seldom indulged treat in a way. She ran her tongue along the inside of her teeth in thought. She caught Squall-as-Vincent staring at her for a moment out of the corner of her eye but his face turned before she could focus on him. It was quieter in the booths, the music merely loud instead of stifling.

“Dancing like that is hard work.” He said shocking her out of her reverie. She sipped her drink to consider an answer a moment before speaking.

“FUN, EVENTUALLY.” She may as well admit her opinion. He glanced over at her then back at the dance floor for a few beats of the bass before his eyes scanned the room.

“Maybe, after we’re done.” He said sipping the drink himself. 

“GIRL?” she asked, the woman was still on her mind.

“She just walked up to me. Asked me to dance.” He admitted with a single-shoulder shrug. 

“WEIRD.” Fujin admitted, when he looked back to her without turning his head she offered a shrug turning her hands up a bit for emphasis.

“We only have until tomorrow night.” He said more tensely, his eyes back on the place.

“GROUND, BEST LEAD.” She reminded him and he sighed visibly, lifting a hand to run it along the shaven parts of his head. Running his fingers back and forth as he considered. Eventually going to tug at his ears.

“GOOD LOOK.” she said suddenly and he turned his head to look at her a moment with an empty face then looked away and down at the floor.

“Thanks.” she couldn’t hear him say it over the music but she could read his lips. 

\------------------------

The night was long. Hours passed on the dance floor or haunting the booths. It felt like half the city had passed through the doors. But the one person they were looking for never did. The whole night was a blur of alcohol, writhing bodies, and strobing lights burning away any definite feeling of time passing. The music was a vibration more than something memorable. Squall as Vincent had his eyes more toward the back space by the bar, so it was Fujin as Lee who first saw them. They came in the front door. Brazen as neon. She drew his attention with just a touch. The appearance was distinctive, Braids was never one to hide. Her thick hair was tied up as her handle implied. 

Every shape and style she could from twists only fractions of an inch wide to a few practically an actual inch. Her clothes were filled with stitches and holes, leather jacket over cloth. Combat boots, fingerless gloves. Metal twinkling in her ears and her eyebrow as she walked. No, there was absolutely no mistaking her. Vincent had imagined that she would try to hide like so many of them had. Lee started to move and he followed her. 

The two of them slithered off the floor, more a part of it every hour they had spent. Both of them had a gentle tingling in their muscles from hours of work. The harshest exercise they had either had in a week. And yet they still felt ready. Fujin’s eye focused like a Hawk’s, Squall looked to the smaller male behind Braids, Chainer no doubt, keeping the last of their targets in sight. 

Braids had made a beeline across the room to a booth, one that had been empty all night. She sat on the edge, her eyes coming around looking through the place before locking on Fujin, she rose to her feet as Fujin approached and a blade appeared in her hand fast as lightning. Well. so much for settling this subtly.

“Lee!? Baby!? Heard you were dead!” Braids screamed to be heard over the music, her voice was shrill, wild as her eyes. There was a certain mania to her smile. 

“I was gonna come looking for you! I learned a new trick! Wanna see?” she said and then took off running. Definitely a Junction. She was fast, faster than a normal person for certain. Squall took a step back and to the side, bare handed against a knife was a rough prospect, when the knife was held by someone who almost certainly had the strength to do real damage with it. Fujin dropped back into a ready stance favoring the side with the knife to evade. The punch took her along the head. She managed to flinch enough to turn the wild cross into a glancing blow but it couldn’t have been comfortable. 

Squall used his space to grasp something unlikely to cause awful collateral if it went wild and thunder danced from his fingers along the wild ganger, her muscles jumping as the electricity did its damage through her body leaving a scorch on the carpet where the bolt grounded out. The shock of the attack and the unsubtle turn toward him gave Fujin exactly the space she needed to step in and go low, slamming a fist into Braid’s solar plexus with a grunt of effort. The slightly larger woman doubled up around the fist, her guts emptying out her mouth in a sickening splatter. 

The knife whipped around and caught Fujin in the side, just between the ribs on her left side, rammed to the hilt. Fujin let out a visible gasp, her eye going wide. Braids had just enough time to straighten and go for a second lower stab aiming for Fujin’s stomach and pushing her back a step with the force of it. Squall stepped in grabbing Braids by the braids with both hands and jumping into her face with his knee, the impact jarred his entire leg but teeth literally flew. The woman fell backward. Both of Fujin’s hands held the knife in place as nerveless fingers let it go. Squall fell down on top of the woman who immediately started struggling. Throwing a wild punch that crackled with shimmering heat at his face. Squall flinched back away from the fist and returned with one of his own, then another. 

The woman tried to buck him, lifting them both. Super strength doesn't grant super traction though and he rose with her. She didn’t avoid the cross punch that whipped her head to the side and stilled her for an instant, stunned just long enough for another punch from the other side as they came back to the ground. He felt something crack, he couldn’t be sure if it was the ganger or the floor. So he swung again. Blood coated his knuckles and the woman’s face. Her head started to turn, her eye glassy and her movement uncoordinated. Squall pulled back just an inch and unleashed Blizzara. Braids found her head trapped in a block of ice pinned to the floor. Her mouth open in a red haze as the paralytic ice held her down. The panic rose quickly in her struggles as fists started to beat on the ice to break it and breath.

Squall staggered backward to his feet looking back at Fujin who pulled the knife out of her side with a flinch and tossed the bloody knife to him, grip first. The double edged switchblade dagger snatched out of the air with a shaky hand nearly swatting it into the ground. Squall switched it to point down and dove back at Braids as she got her feet set and started pushing the ice cracking and scattering as she literally pried her shoulders off the ground shattering the ice. 

Squall landed on her legs. He stabbed her in the chest right over her heart. She gasped. Blood immediately welling. He stabbed again twisting. His teeth ground together, his eyes wide. He grabbed her throat and the third stab drove the blade past the hilt into her chest between her ribs. He felt the cheap metal break off, probably in the concrete below the carpeting. Braids coughed and shook. Her eyes wide and rolling terribly as the bloody froth flecked her lips and she shoved Squall off her flinging him several feet, junction doing nothing to stop basic physics. She staggered up to her feet one hand over her chest as she slumped and staggered blood pouring out of her along with ragged red coughing fits as her lungs tried to get air around the blood. 

She looked up at Squall and her lips moved but he couldn’t hear her, she turned looking for her friend she had come with. Her hand patting her chest, fingers numbly unresponsive. Behind him he felt a flash of cold air as another blizzard class spell went off, presumably Fujin, two more followed it.

Braids’ hand on her chest glowed faintly once then twice growing fainter as she staggered toward the seemingly paralyzed man trying desperately to heal her wounds to little effect. He caught her as she stumbled into him and then she fell. Her chin smacking against the booth as she tumbled and lay still. The blood pooled around her as her heart finally gave up, her brain starving in her skull. The man was frozen, slumped against the booth, eyes open but skin pale white, like he had been dunked in liquid nitrogen. A pistol frozen to his hand in a small block of dripping ice. A shotgun-like spread of ice chunks piercing his chest and neck, the blood trickling only slowly.

Fujin’s breath was heaving and hitching her own hands glowing with curative magic, eye squeezed shut. Squall’s blood was boiling in his veins, his heart pounding. He walked over with long steps and put fingers to Braid’s throat, searching for a pulse and finding nothing. He stood and threw an arm around Fujin, the music was still playing but the screams were getting more numerous. Security was moving toward them.

“We have to go!” Squall said, Fujin could only nod. They turned and headed straight through the confused mass on the dance floor. Those closest looked at them and the blood splattered all over them both, Fujin’s largely her own, Braids donated most of it to Squall’s ensemble. They headed to the entrance followed by security. Pausing in the vestibule he thrust the claim tickets for the weapons. 

“Now.” he said and he was fairly sure that he’d never seen someone move so fast. The gunblades were returned in seconds. He grabbed both of them as they staggered out into the night. The sounds of sirens screaming toward them. Fujin’s movements still favored one side, the magic that she had used to stop the bleeding and close the wound wouldn’t be perfect, it was a rush job after all. So he physically lifted her into his arms, his weapon dangling off his shoulder while she held hers in one hand. He adjusted his junctions to maximize his strength and leapt to the roof. Heading along rooftops was faster, and much harder to track from the ground. 

The flashing lights and sirens converged on the Silver Star within minutes rushing past them as they moved in the darkness of the city. The rain had picked up again. It was coming in fine droplets tasting like ash and stinging his eyes. About two blocks away he finally paused and Fujin looked up at him then struggled subtly. It took him a moment to realize he had been bridle carrying her this whole way and to set her on her feet. She crouched down and pulled up her shirt revealing pale flesh caked with drying clumps of blood on her stomach. She gingerly wiped away what she could showing a messy mass of pink flesh about an inch long. She must have gotten something important because it was a fairly shocking amount of blood for how little time it had had to actually bleed, the stab further up was the wrong angle to have gotten her heart. Looking now he could see the blood around her nose and mouth was slowly washing away in the rain. Seeing that Fujin was mostly alright, Squall let out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding and slumped, almost falling over hands landing on his knees. Fujin let out a hacking cough and spit a glob of red into the gravel taking deep breaths that visibly filled her chest.

“Wow.” he whispered. His body catching up with all the fatigue of the whole operation. He dug around in his jacket and pulled a small watch out. Six hours, they had been in the club all that time for less than two minutes of dirty, cold-blooded, life-flashing murder.

“Hyne… I think I’m gonna vomit.” he says as he looks down to see the front of his shirt splattered with aerosol blood. His hands flaking with it along both palms, lifting his hands to see the red handprints.

“Wow.” he said again as Fujin walked over and placed her hands on the sides of his face pulling his head up.

“ALIVE. SUCCEEDED. BREATH.” She said each word slowly. Keeping her eye locked on his. He took a deep breath and collected himself. 

“Right. Yeah. Okay. I don’t know what happened there.” he says, bringing up a hand to stroke his hair, his eyes breaking away from hers to look at the gravel of the building’s roof. The rain intensified and seemed to get just fractionally colder. 

“HOME.” she said turning toward the west, Squall raised his head and followed her eye line.

“Right.” He agreed and they set off leaping from roof to roof for a few blocks before dipping through alleys and side streets, keeping off the main road as they went. 

\------------------

Standing in front of the mirror, Squall washed his hands. Their clothes hung over every surface, each of them had taken turns waterlogging then scrubbing everything they had worn to get the blood out. It had been fairly cathartic to Squall who had come to grips with the shock of it all. Most of his killing had been done at arms length, it felt different to ram a switchblade through someone’s heart with a hand around their throat where you could feel their heart race and ripple as it tried to beat and found it couldn’t. The terror in her eyes. The words Braids had mouthed, it flashed behind his eyelids as he closed his eyes. It reminded him of the first time he had killed. The Galbadian soldiers in Dollet. This felt more personal though. It took him a little while to really pin it down. Her round face, big brown eyes, wide smile. And she’d stabbed Fujin in the kidney. Squall sighed and splashed his face with water before walking out of the bathroom into the cool air of the apartment. The gentle sounds of rain pattering against the drafty windows. Fujin was sitting at her table staring at the phone a smoke in her lips as the faint white whisps hung in the air around her head.

“Venta?” he asked and she nodded. He walked over to her and stood beside the table, accepting the cigarette without comment. Taking a deep pull and handing it back as he exhaled a small cloud. 

“I don’t think I can sleep just yet.” Squall said honestly after a moment of silence.

“Same.” Fujin commented, quietly, the fire banked in her voice as she stared out the window into the rain with him. 

The darkness of the pre-dawn clouds rumbled with distant thunder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you as always for taking the time to read my story all ~10 of you who regularly read what I have to say. thank you for taking the time and please consider leaving a comment to tell me what I have done well and what I could improve upon.


	11. On a Windowsill

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Admitting to things can be hard, it's like peeling off layers, eventually you hit flesh. From there it only hurts more. sometimes there are better ways than just saying it. Sometimes, there aren't.

Fujin sat at the table, Squall standing over it one hand resting on the surface. A small messenger bag rested between them filled with Galbadian gil notes. Squall, used to the transfer notes that Garden largely operated with, watched in fascination as Fujin counted the bills, stacked them and separated them by face value with a speed that would shame some clerical workers. 

“I’m guessing you have done this a lot?” He asked quietly and she snorted a small smirk in the corner of her mouth before she made a tiny shushing noise. He took the hint not to interrupt her further and took a step back amusing himself with watching her count. Yet another skill that made sense only in context. He walked to the empty space in the middle of the room and then carefully sat down on the ground and laid on the hardwood floor without comment. He heard a second snort from the table. He ignored her derision, focusing on his breathing and relaxing his body and mind. Something to fill the time where there was no other reasonable activity. The phone rang, Fujin lifted it to her ear, listening intently. Squall could hear someone speaking softly on the other side for a few seconds.

“NO.” She said definitively, waited a few more seconds, Squall could just hear the word bitch and Fujin placed the phone firmly back in its cradle without hesitation. He let out a breath as she resumed counting.

There were moments like this where the lack of direction to focus his effort was frustrating. His meditative state was broken some time later by the sound of Fujin scooting her chair back and standing up. He turned his head slightly to regard her as she walked to stand over him, barefoot in canvas pants and a sleeveless shirt with a jacket over her shoulders to fight the chill in the room. She looked down at him, an elbow held in one hand and her cheek in the other. 

“COMFORTABLE?” she asked with an amused little smirk on her face. He let his eyes stare up at the ceiling and considered her rhetorical question seriously.

“Yes, actually.” he responded and her smirk disappeared. Then she took off her jacket, tossed it a bit to the side and lowered herself to the ground beside him, her hands resting on her stomach as she stared up at the ceiling. 

“DISAGREE.” she stated after a minute’s contemplation.

“It’s not for everyone.” he said simply and she let out a small huff of laughter, he chuckled audibly.

“Do you think we could fit a couch up the stairs? Or would we have to take it in the window?” Squall asked suddenly. Fujin was quiet for a moment before responding.

“HALLWAY, COMMON.” She said with surety. 

“Want to go hunt one down?” He asked looking over. She turned her head toward him questioningly.

“We have to lay low a little while anyway right?” He asked and she closed her eye and tilted her head in a low-effort shrug.

“COMFORTABLE.” she said and he snorted. 

“Grew on you?” he asked with a cocked eyebrow and she performed another low effort shrug. He chuckled and they lay together on the floor a while in peaceable silence. The consideration though lingered in his mind and he resolved when they cruised out inevitably to get more food somewhere to keep an eye out for a couch...

\-------------

Three weeks and one very careful ascent later and they discovered the couch was long enough so both of them could lay across it and not have the other’s feet in their face. It had been remarkably easy to get it up when they had finally found one that they could walk off with. Walking across the district with it had turned a few heads but not for long. After all, they were dressed like street trash, what’s weird about someone trying to save a few gil? 

“Not bad.” Squall said staring at the blank wall of the apartment, appreciating the somewhat worn cushions of the practically-free couch they had found. 

“NOPE.” Fujin answers, laying back putting her arms behind her head. 

“Good way to use a morning.” Squall added to a small noise of agreement. A few moments lounging on their accomplishment brought something to Squall’s mind.

“There is something I want to know, though.” He said adjusting so he could look at her, she twisted a little to look back at him questioningly, her visible eyebrow rising.

“What are all those buckets for?” he asks. It had been lingering on the edge of his attention every time he looked at them. Just a random collection of plastic and sticks.

“DRUMS.” she said simply and his head recoiled with shock.

“Huh. Okay. that makes sense.” he said scratching his chin. A few long moments spread before she spoke up again.

“INSTRUMENTS?” she asked, it was part of the SeeD curriculum to at least learn two instruments, though more was encouraged. It added more places one could blend in and provided a skill based hobby for many as a coping mechanism for exceptionally stressful life as a mercenary. Squall considered. He was passable on a few instruments, excelling as he always had succeeding by sheer bloody minded determination. Though there were some ways of making music he preferred.

“I learned trumpet, saxophone, violin, and fiddle, though really it’s just two ways of playing one instrument.” He spoke slowly, thinking it out as he spoke, then looked to her questioningly.

“DRUMS, GUITAR, TROMBONE, CELLO.” she listed off on her fingers.

“I’ve never heard of anybody playing buckets.” Squall said, curious more than dismissively. She shifted and pushed herself up as he shifted.

“Hey, you don’t have to?” He said after her as she walked into the bedroom and started audibly separating and tapping on buckets. Somewhere a stick skittered across the floor. He flopped back down to the couch and waited. She was going to. 

It took her a few minutes of tapping to pick out what she wanted then came back into the main space with two buckets, one she flipped over and sat on the other she placed in front of her holding two sticks that looked like they had been dowels in a previous existence. She put one in each hand and tapped the corner of the bucket experimentally while spinning the other dowel lazily with her off hand in a display of manual dexterity.

Music played on a single bucket was a little different. He had to admit she could get some incredible variety of tone out of it hitting different places and lifting the corner with her feet braced on each side to keep it from going places. She had very fast hands. Her ability to keep a simple beat at roughly four times the note density was actually extremely impressive. He watched, listened really, in silence until she literally kicked the bucket away from her and dropped the dowels with a flourish and a relieved woosh of air from her mouth throwing her arms up and jumping to her feet.

“Yeah, alright, that was actually really impressive.” He said, clapping politely as he sat up with a smile. She strutted back to the couch and flopped down taking up a wide swath arms spread across its back and knees comfortably far apart. 

“Something to do in the downtime?” He asked as she breathed deep breaths. She waved her head back and forth some raising one hand to give it an ambivalent shake.

“Amongst other things I imagine.” He said and she huffed. They sat in companionable silence broken only when her sitting on his legs started to give them pins and needles necessitating him pulling his legs out from under her and her pulling them across her lap then going back to spreading her arms across the back of the couch as they basked in a companionable silence. He watched as she slowly brought a hand down and lay it on his knee. She turned her head to make eye contact then squeezed some kind of sweet spot around his kneecap that made him let out a strangled, high-pitched noise and jump a little. She devolved into stitches of laughter, pointing at him and cackling so hard her face started to turn red as he sat up far enough to put a palm against her head and give it a shove. She flailed at him playfully and ended up falling sideways. Squall decided to sit up and pull her legs across his lap, reversing their positions. His face smoothed from the smile he’d gathered back to a more serious expression.

It took a few moments of breathing quickly to open her eye and when she looked up at him she sobered quickly as well. He looked down at her, a ghost of sadness behind a thoughtful expression, Fujin remembered this look. Whenever he was remembering the past the same sort of melancholy would descend on him. She understood to an extent, there were many good times behind her too. 

“I’m…” he started then stopped. Her brows pulled together and she decided to wait, he still had that expression, unbroken by resignation or frustration, he’d continue when he strung the words together.

“I was really scared when she stabbed you.” The revelation softened her face. It had been a pretty frightening moment. But even though the blade had hurt pretty badly, punctured a lung, her heart was fine and she had plenty of time to focus on healing magic. She opened her mouth to say as much but he held up a few fingers just barely above her knee where his hands rested on her knee and calves.

“I know, you weren't in any real danger, not at that point. But… We’ve only been on this mission for what? A month? Heh… Hyne help me. Feels like it did during the war… I guess… what I’m trying to say is… whew, there’s no way to say this is there…” he said, bringing up a hand to rub the back of his head then presses it into his face with a chagrined smile. 

“This is so messed up…” He let out a nervous little laugh and she shifted putting her elbows under herself to push a little further up.

“WHAT?” her heart having been slowly picking up steam. It took a fair amount of will just to hold onto a calm facade.

“Why… You have every reason to hate me. I’m glad you don’t. Whatever this….” he said, bringing back his hand to lay on her calf again.

“Is, I…” he trailed off again looking away from her, his face turning slowly red as his throat worked but he didn’t make any noises. Just as it looked like his will was going to break and she felt the tension in his body rise to begin to stand up, her hand shot out and grabbed onto his firmly. He paused and she quickly turned his hand so they were holding hands palm to palm. 

His face turned back to hers where she wore a look of concentration. Her other hand came up and she sat up. His eyes went wide as she brought her face up to his and he started to pull back.

She placed her hand on the back of his head and brought their foreheads together. Eye to eye. 

“Squall.” she said softly, and then almost laughed as her throat closed right up too, she swallowed the nervous squirming in her stomach and spoke softly.

“I c-care about you too.” she admitted, her breath smelled like the spiced pork they had for lunch mixing with the smell of her, The sharp antiseptic smell of her soap that lingered just as a gasp under the earth of her skin sweat and warmth. She felt warm against his forehead, her fingers firm and just slightly cool. But maybe it was only because his face had finished brightening into a rosey blush. Her eye was bright, looking so closely he could see every little detail, mesmerizing in its intensity and the furious feeling rioting beneath. He could feel how tense she was even to her legs where his fingers lay against the dense strong fiber of her pants, the tone of her muscle standing out like a spring coiled.

Her heart was pounding in her neck, stifling her as she looked into his pale eyes, past the frostiness of their color, the grey under blue so like a glacier as they danced like a river taking in detail so keenly. She could almost see his heart beat through his eyes, the fear, the melancholy holding to the edges, the anticipation. She could feel the short shorn hairs on his scalp under her fingers shift as his hair tried to stand on end, she felt it too, like a wave of pins and needles. His skin was hot under her fingers. But he wasn’t sweating yet. Every time she touched him she marveled at it. She was often cold, it was a numbness in the background of her attention, he was so warm. All the way to his eyes where she imagined she could see warmth like hot spring water beneath the ice.

They held this shockingly intimate position for a few heartbeats, then he pulled back gently and she let him go, pulling her hand back from his head and bringing it back to let herself fall back down onto the couch. He looked away from her only slowly, his eyes kept shifting back for just a moment before he looked away. Her boldness had tied her stomach in knots but as the silence stretched, their hands stayed held together. She knew because she was doing the same thing.

“SO, um… music?” Fujin ventured her confidence wavering in light of their little moment.

“I listen to a little… I guess some people call it lounge music? Jazz, piano...small band stuff.” He says softly, as though speaking too loudly will shatter some fragile aspect of the moment.

“Usually a little… um, slower, than the stuff they were playing at that club.” He keeps talking awkwardly to keep his actual question out of his mouth. 

“I didn’t really take the time for it for its own sake.” He lapsed into a pregnant pause thinking.

“I was pretty much buried, heh.” he said softly. Fujin made a small noise of amusement drawing him to look back to find her with a tight-lipped, suppressed smirk. 

The ringing of the telephone made both of them jump, share a look and with a sigh and a quick disentanglement Fujin nearly stomped over to the phone and snatched it up to her ear, holding it quietly. Squall could hear a woman’s voice on the other end though he could not reliably make out the words. 

“YES.” Squall watched Fujin carefully, her tense body language and the way she glanced back to him. He found he could read more into her from here. He lounged as he had been Fujin sounded upset, her normally sharp enunciation clipped off the end of her word. 

“NO.” 

“TWO.” There was a long pause.

“TEAM.” She said sharply, then frowned, tapping her foot one fist planted in her hip. Whatever the next question was made Fujin recoil slightly and look concerned then her eye angered in thought. She pulled away her head from the receiver covering the mouthpiece.

“SING?” she asked at a slightly lower volume. He lifted a hand flat and wavered it with a small shrug. She nodded and lifted it back up.

“YES.” She said looking at him questioningly, listening with one ear and questioning him with her eyes. He crossed his arms and shrugged.

“TWO DAYS.” She said and then put down the receiver. Squall waited for her to walk back over and drop onto the couch before he spoke. 

“Work?” He asked and she nodded.

“BODYGUARD.” she said and chewed the inside of her cheek a moment. Squall waited as she thought.

“THREE DAYS.” she added. Squall frowned.

“Some kind of event…?” He asked and she nodded. 

“EXHIBITION.” Squall nodded. That made sense, a large event with a lot of strangers moving together.

“SING?” she asked after a moment turning to look him in the eye.

“I can, I guess.” She stared at him a few more moments searchingly before she let it drop. They sat beside each other in an awkward silence a few moments before throwing her legs across his lap. 

“MEETING.” She said, throwing an arm across her eyes. Squall hesitantly placed a hand on her calf the other was thrown across the top of the couch carelessly. 

“That’s what’s happening in two days?” Fujin nodded slightly in assent.

“I was starting to get restless.” He admitted easily enough and she sighed relaxing slightly into the couch.

\--------------

Squall carefully adjusted his second hand jacket. The alterations he’d made weren't perfect but the suit hung well enough. Ironically that was probably for the best, some street trash wouldn’t exactly have something fine on hand and they hardly had the time to get something from a tailor with the money they had on hand so it was a quick alteration. He’d gotten rather deft with a needle even compared to some of his classmates who put more effort into their clothing. His particular style was largely absent for what he felt were obvious reasons, but he’d made due. Black was a fine color for him.

Fujin actually had a fine suit, looking sharp in slacks with a button up dress shirt and a smart vest in an ocean-like blue that really highlighted her natural coloration. It would draw attention away from him in any event. 

The meeting was at a fancy restaurant in the downtown of Deling, to the point where they had to leave the weapons at home. Not the biggest imposition, but it still left him feeling naked. Fujin maintained her poise without falter so he took her example, straightened his back and kept a step behind her as they walked into the dimly lit establishment in the late afternoon, the sun still high enough that the clouds hid it lending the candle lights all the more gravity. When they arrived their client was already seated with two thickly built individuals sitting at the table immediately outside the booth. An effective deterrent, they had a military look about them despite the more casual attire. Squall didn’t stare at them, and they didn’t pay him any visible mind besides slowing their talking a bit as the pair approached and slid into the booth side by side Fujin first with Squall on the outside. 

The woman they sat across from was middle aged, lines were just forming at the corners of her eyes and mouth. Her brown hair was elaborately pinned into an offset bun with a gilded comb. Her smile was practiced, inviting but with a warning. 

“Hello ‘Lee’, I do not believe we have had the pleasure…” She started, and Squall’s brain hung on the way that the woman said Fujin’s name. He did his best to sit still and not draw attention. Largely keeping his eyes on the obvious guards at the table next to them. 

“MA’AM.” Fujin said smoothly, making no effort to extend a hand or anything else. The other woman took this in stride.

“I had heard you were direct. No matter, I am Demelza Echt, and I have reason to believe my life is in danger regarding an upcoming event, as I expressed over the telephone.” the woman elaborated, Squall suspected mainly for his benefit. 

“The short version is that I expect at some point to be attacked at the event. It is a number of art showcases, four to be exact. Over a week I will want an escort through all of the events. I have heard from reliable sources you are capable and… uniquely powerful, is your…. Associate? As well?” she asked, turning her head to look at Squall who politely slid his eyes back as he was being addressed.

“YES. JUNCTIONED, TRAINED.” Fujin’s tone was just slightly derisive, Squall actually doubted that the woman could tell, judging by her expression as it lightened slightly. 

“Good. That’s good. Unfortunately I am only allowed a plus one, so I will have to arrange something for you my boy. But if Lee is correct, it may be simple. How well can you sing, boy?” she asked softly. Her smile riding the knife edge of condescending. 

“I practice regularly.” He stated conservatively the woman frowned, unimpressed.

“Many drunks practice singing regularly, that doesn’t mean they have any actual skill. I’m asking you to prove yourself, boy.” she says enunciating sharply, keeping a polite tone for the moment. Squall glanced at Fujin met his eye and gave him a twitch that might have been a shrug. Squall huffed a silent gripe and took a few deep breaths.

“What do you want me to sing?” He asked, hoping for some kind of hint as to the kind of music expected of him.

“What about ‘Eyes on me’?” Demelza suggested. Squall grimaced slightly. That had been Rinoa’s favorite song. He knew it, by heart. Fujin read his hesitance immediately and her head turned slightly toward him. He raised his head and moistened his lips to signal his intent, Fujin relaxed slightly as Squall sung, softly. Moderating his voice to keep it from carrying far. 

His words were slow, without backing his voice nonetheless carried the weight of the verse. Forlorn love, though his words carried it deeper the tune turning darker, no longer did love merely miss them, but that it died there on the floor. Bled out and empty, angry even at the time lost, and the heartache. He sang the whole thing and nobody stopped him, nobody moved. Fujin’s lips fell open, slowly and Demleza looked like she wanted to cry. Even the two bodyguards' conversation had fallen silent as he sang his soft dirge. He stopped at the end of the first chorus, and turned his head away from the table. 

“Satisfied?” He asked, barely above a whisper. His throat felt rather tight by the end and he took a glass of water to combat the bad taste in his mouth.

“What did you say your name was?” The woman asked, her voice betraying her shock.

“Vincent.” he answered simply.

“...I have never heard a version of that song like that. And I remember the woman who wrote it.” Demelza said, regaining her poise quickly. 

“...Thank you, Ma’am.” he said with the distinct cadence of ‘whatever’. Fujin turned her face back to face Demelza who seemed to shake herself from a distant memory.

“Good, I will arrange a position, there is intended to be live music. We'll get you into the event under that auspice, it can be arranged, I believe. As for you Miss Lee, you will be required to stay with me, and to that end, I will provide something… suitable… to wear.” the matronly woman said, looking at Fujin’s attire derisively. 

“This is to be something of a high society event, what society is left in Deling. The provincials have taken much of our best and brightest to the outlands with their rebellion. No matter. It will be resolved in time.” she said with the conviction of one sure in their beliefs. Squall and Fujin both were silent in the face of that. 

“I need you both to mind your place, and not embarrass anyone. “ Squall’s face darkened minutely, Fujin’s poker face remained immaculate. 

“GIL.” Fujin cut in, the woman looked wrong footed a moment.

“Oh, your pay? Four days of your time, and the opportunity to be seen in high society as a bonus…” Demelza trailed off considering, sizing up Fujin primarily. Squall’s eye slid over to his friend as well as she considered. 

“ONE HUNDRED SEVEN.” She stated firmly, Demelza looked to consider this, a delicate frown forming so as not to exacerbate her wrinkles. Squall blinked at the specificity, though Demelza shot back quite quickly. 

“I’ll be providing your clothing, it wouldn’t do to have you mis-match, One hundred even.” Fujin raised her nose, lip curling just lightly with a delicate sniff and made a show of turning her head to Squall, to Demelza’s consternation if her audible sigh was anything to go by. It was a massive amount more money than he’d expected. It was true what they say, get people to focus on something small and they’ll let something big slip by…

“...I guess.” he said and Fujin nodded, looking back to Demelza who looked a touch like an agitated pigeon, puffed up and imperious despite the danger. Perhaps she didn’t even realize the danger. It dawned upon Squall that she might well not. SeeD’s power was unbelievable. It sounded like a monster. That a human could be monstrous sounded like a fantasy, her ease insulting them might be from a place of security. His mood darkened fractionally. It wasn’t his problem, not really. And apparently he was going to have to sing in front of people. This mission wasn’t one he would have asked for, and yet. Nothing to be done, when the phone rings they had a choice to make. They still had most of the money from the last job, this would set them for potentially many months. For a few days watching high strung nobility snipe at each other. At least he wouldn’t be expected to talk to any of them… his musings snapped back in as a small fold of bills crossed the table where Fujin pulled it to her with two firm fingers, tucking it in her breast pocket carelessly.

“TOMORROW.” Fujin said as Demelza nodded slightly. Fujin placed a hand on the seat between them and Squall stepped out of the booth smoothly following her lead. He’d thought they might stay for food but Fujin apparently wasn’t inclined. Judging by the look on Miss Echt’s face, she had been expecting them to stay as well. 

“Have a good night, Ma’am.” Squall said prefuncterally, turning his back on the woman to head to the door less than a pace behind Fujin. 

Once they stepped out into the cool evening air of Deling city, it wasn’t quite frost yet, but soon the damp would turn to ice. They started to head out, heading to a rooftop first. He took a deep breath of sharp air, coughing at the metal taste that settled on the back of his palette.

“Squall.” Fujin said softly and his head turned to her, rarely did she let her game face slip when she wasn’t home. They took a route around, walking through alleys and side streets in their usual method to throw off tails, ascending to rooftops and dropping to the pavement cutting impossibly from place to place. Her word took him as they walked across the gravel of a rooftop.

He turned his face back to her, she stopped walking briefly, a pensive look on her face.

“Why…” she trailed off, holding her elbow awkwardly picking at her pants a moment before sighing and walking past him to head to the next building. He frowned but fell in behind her again.

“I like singing… for me…” he said softly, but he could tell by her moment of hesitation that she had heard.

“Could…. Do you know ’Excuse Me’?” She asked, walking after him. 

“It doesn’t sound as good without a violin.” She pulled the short stack of bills out of her pocket holding it between her index and middle fingers. He stopped walking and shifted his weight onto one leg. They stood in a fairly uncomfortable silence for a few moments before he spoke up when it was clear she wasn’t going to.

“...sure.” he said as they changed their path.

\---------------

A few hours later, Squall stood on the street corner a few blocks up from the shop. They had finally found an instrument in workable condition for a price that wasn’t awful. Squall was gently flicking a string with a finger and listening intently as he tuned the instrument against itself having gotten one string in key in the shop. Fujin smiled listening to individual notes to avoid feeling awkward; he had insisted she bought a guitar, strings with strings. And there was little chance of them getting a piano into that little apartment. It was lazily held over her shoulder while he fiddled with his fiddle. The most remarkable thing to Fujin was watching him gently produce notes while walking without interruption. It wasn’t exactly playing and walking, but it was impressive nonetheless. She couldn’t do that with a guitar. At least not how she tended to play. The walk back to the home was a fairly quick one all told. 

Arriving back Squall was finished with his tuning and stood firmly in the middle of the room bringing the violin up to his cheek and taking a deep breath before he started to play. Fujin set down the guitar on the couch immediately plopping down to listen as he began to play something relatively slow seemingly testing his fingers. He interrupted himself a number of times squeaking a note or misplacing a finger but on the fifth attempt he seemed to find his stride and played through a short piece. Finishing it with a small smile.

“I guess I do remember how to play.” He said seemingly mostly to himself.

Fujin provided quiet applause and indeed there was a smattering of applause through one of the walls. Fujin’s eyes widened a little and Squall turned pink at the attention but gathered himself to try something a little faster, more a jig than the slow roll of his previous piece. Fujin, finding herself on the edge of her seat consciously slid back and leaned into the old fluff of the couch but she couldn’t stop one foot from bouncing a little along to the beat. 

“SING?” she asked as he seemed to be winding down.

“Um… lemme think.” he said stretching his hand and pressing his fingers into his palm thoughtfully before deciding.

There’s always a difference between an unaccompanied piece and hearing the music to go with it. Floria’s Nightingale was an old song, she’d insisted her great grandmother had taught it to her, who had insisted it had come all the way from Centra. But it was simple and though it lacked rhyme it had a smoothness to it that Squall really brought out in the vibrato played against the strings. Her ears practically rang with the silence of the piece’s ending. 

“LOVE.” she said without thought. Squall brought the violin down from his cheek. 

“I really need to look at the sheets for that again… I think I messed up part of it.” He said quietly justrifying as he walked over to the kitchen table to set down the violin gently.

“DIDN’T NOTICE.” she said, truth be told she hadn’t ever heard the whole piece before, just the opening notes, which she was pretty sure everybody knew. 

“You going to tune that thing or play it with loose strings?” he asked as a way of changing the subject. She looked over at the Guitar she had been talked into buying and lifted it. 

“C.” she said simply and he picked up the violin again with a sigh and sawed a C for a few moments while she began her tuning. 

“At least now we’ll have something to do besides train in the alley and sit around.” He said with some hope hiding behind his deadpan.

“AFTER.” she said gently and he nodded. The job was going to take a few days, though not the whole day. There was something… lightening about playing music again. He hadn’t really gotten much out of it before at Garden. But he couldn’t help but feel that the darkness of the city had weighed on him. A song sprung to mind, and found its way out his lips even as he looked to the dark of the window. It had been four weeks since he had seen the sun. 

“Excuse me while I run… I really gotta get, outta, here.” He sang softly and looked out the window. The sound of guitar strings interrupted for a moment then resumed more quickly. He stood by the window, listening to notes and chords echoing. Once she seemed satisfied she gently started strumming and the opening notes of the song he had sung from started to play. It drew him from staring out the window, to look back at her while she looked at him evenly, but with a note of pleading. He sighed and quietly started singing. Her rendition isn’t perfect, she misses some chords, her time wandering a little from his memory of the song, but the soul is there. He forgets a few of the words, letting them go. They can both feel the sentiment though. The banked embers at the heart of the song putting out scorching heat. At some point during the slow song filled with a kind of pain his eyes had closed. He opened them in the last stanza to feel the moisture in his eyes and sees it mirrored in hers. As the last words echo out she misses a note and pauses to run the back of her hand across her eye, then returning to muddle through the end.

She set aside the guitar. He stepped back over to the window. He could hear her walking around behind him, keeping her distance as he looked back out to the puddles from last night.   
He heard her gather up the buckets that had been shuffling around the room stacking them back up and setting them aside with the guitar sounded like. The instruments ending up crowding around the largely disused table. Both of them typically prefer to eat on the floor than at it. Squall reached into his jacket pocket pulling out the package of smokes, opening it and fishing one out with the lighter and lighting it. He didn’t even cough anymore, probably a bad sign. He was getting used to it. He heard Fujin walk up behind him, he took the roll from his lips and offered it over his shoulder. She took his shoulder and turned him around instead. 

He paused looking her in the eye; his confused and questioning the look of pensiveness and shallow, rickety courage in hers. 

“Squall.” she said softly. Then her lips came together and her eye slid to the smoke plucking it from his fingers and putting it in her lips. His eyes settled watching the tip burn bright cherry red as her mouth flexed and she held it to the side, then spread her arms stepped into him. The impact of her body on his swayed him nearly knocking him over despite its gentleness.

“I feel it too.” She said softly, her chin resting on his shoulder, her words just past his ear, a whisper. He wrapped his arms back around her, loosely his warm fingers against her relatively cool skin. That was something that always bothered him, no matter what she was always cold, he noticed it every night when she ended up laying against him, wherever she touched him she leeched the heat out of him leaving him feeling cool. Sleeping touching someone else usually left him sweaty, he was always hot, coat, gloves, didn’t matter, hot with or without. Seemed like she had the opposite problem. He could swear he could feel where she was by the chill alone. They stood like that. Holding each other close it felt natural, it felt easy, even with his back against the wall he felt like he was standing tall here. All at once it crashed down on him and his jaw clenched, tightened to where it hurt. His grip tightened and she stiffened before hers did too. 

“You feel it too.” he said softly. She didn’t make a sound but he could feel her heartbeat speed against his cheek. He was sure she could feel his do the same.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lighter chapter, I think I made my point with the last one. Fujin lived here for more than a year. Consider the consequences. As always, thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed it. Please leave me a comment telling me what you liked, what you didn't, and what I can improve.


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